c..    r«jv»  i  i-.  in  . 

!!••  ,nont  Ave  , 
ailelphiit.  P:i. 


SLAVERY 


BY 


WILLIAM    E.    CHANNING 


BOSTON: 
JAMES   MUNROE    AND    COMPANY. 

MDCCCXXXV. 


Entered  according  to  Act  of  Congress,  in  the  year  1835,  by  JAMES 
MUNROE  &  Co.,  in  the  Clerk's  office  of  the  District  Court  of  Mas 
sachusetts. 


CAMBRIDGE   PRESS: 

METCALF,      TORRY,     AND     BALLOU 


JU      I      ]   f 

G4- 


CONTENTS. 


Page 
INTRODUCTION 1 

CHAPTER  I. 
Property 13 

CHAPTER   II. 
Rights  : 30 

CHAPTER  III. 
Explanations 54 

CHAPTER  IV. 
The  Evils  of  Slavery 65 

CHAPTER   V. 
Scripture 108 

CHAPTER   VI. 

Means  of  Removing  Slavery         .'      .        .        .        .116 

CHAPTER   VII. 
Abolitionism 130 

CHAPTER   VIII. 
Duties 149 

NOTES 161 


M521317 


INTRODUCTION. 


THE  first  question  to  be  proposed  by  a  rational 
being  is,  not  what  is  profitable,  but  what  is  Right. 
Duty  must  be  primary,  prominent,  most  conspicu 
ous,  among  the  objects  of  human  thought  and  pur 
suit.  If  we  cast  it  down  from  its  supremacy,  if  we 
inquire  first  for  our  interests  and  then  for  our  du 
ties,  we  shall  certainly  err.  We  can  never  see  the 
Right  clearly  and  fully,  but  by  making  it  our  first 
concern.  No  judgment  can  be  just  or  wise,  but 
that  which  is  built  on  the  conviction  of  the  para 
mount  worth  and  importance  of  Duty.  This  is  the 
fundamental  truth,  the  supreme  law  of  reason ; 
and  the  mind,  which  does  not  start  from  this  in  its 
inquiries  into  human  affairs,  is  doomed  to  great, 
perhaps  fatal  error. 

The  Right  is  the  supreme  good,  and  includes  all 
other  goods.  In  seeking  and  adhering  to  it,  we 
secure  our  true  and  only  happiness.  All  prosper 
ity,  not  founded  on  it,  is  built  on  sand.  If  human 
affairs  are  controlled,  as  we  believe,  by  Almighty 
Rectitude  and  Impartial  Goodness,  then  to  hope 
1 


for  happiness  from  wrong  doing  is  as  insane  as  to 
seek  health  and  prosperity  by  rebelling  against  the 
laws  of  nature,  by  sowing  cur  seed  on  the  ocean, 
or  making  poison  our  common  food.  There  is  but 
one  unfailing  good  ;  and  that  is,  fidelity  to  the  Ever 
lasting  Law  written  on  the  heart,  and  rewritten 
and  republished  in  God's  Word. 

Whoever  places  this  faith  in  the  everlasting  law 
of  rectitude  must  of  course  regard  the  question  of 
slavery  first  and  chiefly  as  a  moral  question.  All 
other  considerations  will  weigh  little  with  him, 
compared  with  its  moral  character  and  moral 
influences.  The  following  remarks,  therefore,  are 
designed  to  aid  the  reader  in  forming  a  just  moral 
judgment  of  slavery.  Great  truths,  inalienable 
rights,  everlasting  duties,  these  will  form  the 
chief  subjects  of  this  discussion.  There  are 
times  when  the  assertion  of  great  principles  is 
the  best  service  a  man  can  render  society.  The 
present  is  a  moment  of  bewildering  excitement, 
when  men's  minds  are  stormed  and  darkened  by 
strong  passions  and  fierce  conflicts  ;  and  also  a 
moment  of  absorbing  worldliness,  when  the  moral 
law  is  made  to  bow  to  expediency,  and  its  high 
and  strict  requirements  are  decried  or  dismissed  as 
metaphysical  abstractions,  or  impracticable  theo 
ries.  At  such  a  season,  to  utter  great  principles 
without  passion,  and  in  the  spirit  of  unfeigned  and 
universal  good-will,  and  to  engrave  them  deeply 


3 

and  durably  on  men's  minds,  is  to  do  more  for 
the  world,  than  to  open  mines  of  wealth,  or  to 
frame  the  most  successful  schemes  of  policy. 

Of  late  our  country  has  been  convulsed  by  the 
question  of  slavery  ;  and  the  people,  in  proportion 
as  they  have  felt  vehemently,  have  thought  super 
ficially,  or  hardly  thought  at  all ;  and  we  see  the 
results  in  a  singular  want  of  well  defined  princi 
ples,  in  a  strange  vagueness  and  inconsistency  of 
opinion,  and  in  the  proneness  to  excess  which 
belongs  to  unsettled  minds.  The  multitude  have 
been  called,  now  to  contemplate  the  horrors  of 
slavery,  and  now  to  shudder  at  the  ruin  and  blood 
shed  which  must  follow  emancipation.  The  word 
Massacre  has  resounded  through  the  land,  striking 
terror  into  strong  as  well  as  tender  hearts,  and 
awakening  indignation  against  whatever  may  seem 
to  threaten  such  a  consummation.  The  conse 
quence  is,  that  not  a  few  dread  all  discussion  of 
the  subject,  and  if  not  reconciled  to  the  continu 
ance  of  slavery,  at  least  believe  that  they  have  no 
duty  to  perform,  no  testimony  to  bear,  no  influence 
to  exert,  no  sentiments  to  cherish  and  spread,  in 
relation  to  this  evil.  What  is  still  worse,  opinions 
either  favoring  or  extenuating  it  are  heard  with 
little  or  no  disapprobation.  Concessions  are  made 
to  it  which  would  once  have  shocked  the  commu 
nity  ;  whilst  to  assail  it  is  pronounced  unwise  and 
perilous.  No  stronger  reason  for  a  calm  exposition 


of  its  true  character  can  be  given,  than  this  very 
state  of  the  public  mind.  A  community  can  suffer 
no  greater  calamity  than  the  loss  of  its  principles. 
Lofty  and  pure  sentiment  is  the  life  and  hope  of  a 
people.  There  was  never  such  an  obligation  to 
discuss  slavery  as  at  this  moment,  when  recent 
events  have  done  much  to  unsettle  and  obscure 
men's  minds  in  regard  to  it.  This  result  is  to  be 
ascribed  in  part  to  the  injudicious  vehemence  of 
those  who  have  taken  into  their  hands  the  care  of 
the  slave.  Such  ought  to  remember  that  to 
espouse  a  good  cause  is  not  enough.  We  must 
maintain  it  in  a  spirit  answering  to  its  dignity.  Let 
no  man  touch  the  great  interests  of  humanity, 
who  does  not  strive  to  sanctify  himself  for  the  work 
by  cleansing  his  heart  of  all  wrath  and  uncharita- 
bleness,  who  cannot  hope  that  he  is  in  a  measure 
baptized  unto  the  spirit  of  universal  love.  Even 
sympathy  with  the  injured  and  oppressed  may  do 
harm,  by  being  partial,  exclusive,  and  bitterly 
indignant.  How  far  the  declension  of  the  spirit  of 
freedom  is  to  be  ascribed  to  the  cause  now  sug 
gested  I  do  not  say.  The  effect  is  plain,  and 
whoever  sees  and  laments  the  evil  should  strive  to 
arrest  it. 

Slavery  ought  to  be  discussed.  We  ought  to 
think,  feel,  speak,  and  write  about  it.  But  what 
ever  we  do  in  regard  to  it  should  be  done  with  a 
deep  feeling  of  responsibility,  and  so  done  as  not  to 


put  in  jeopardy  the  peace  of  the  slave-holding 
States.  On  this  point  public  opinion  has  not  been 
and  cannot  be  too  strongly  pronounced.  Slavery, 
indeed,  from  its  very  nature,  must  be  a  ground  of 
alarm  wherever  it  exists.  Slavery  and  security  can 
by  no  device  be  joined  together.  But  we  may 
not,  must  not,  by  rashness  and  passion  increase  the 
peril.  To  instigate  the  slave  to  insurrection  is  a 
crime  for  which  no  rebuke  and  no  punishment 
can  be  too  severe.  This  would  be  to  involve 
slave  and  master  in  common  ruin.  It  is  not  enough 
to  say,  that  the  Constitution  is  violated  by  any 
action  endangering  the  slave-holding  portion  of  our 
country.  A  higher  law  than  the  Constitution  for 
bids  this  unholy  interference.  Were  our  national 
union  dissolved,  we  ought  to  reprobate,  as  sternly 
as  we  now  do,  the  slightest  manifestation  of  a  dispo 
sition  to  stir  up  a  servile  war.  Still  more,  were  the 
free  and  the  slave-holding  States  not  only  separated, 
but  engaged  in  the  fiercest  hostilities,  the  former 
would  deserve  the  abhorrence  of  the  world,  and  the 
indignation  of  Heaven,  were  they  to  resort  to  insur 
rection  and  massacre  as  means  of  victory.  Better 
were  it  for  us  to  bare  our  own  breasts  to  the  knife 
of  the  slave,  than  to  arm  him  with  it  against  his 
master. 

It  is  not  by  personal,  direct  action  on  the  mind  of 
the  slave  that  we  can  do  him  good.  Our  concern 
is  with  the  free.  With  the  free  we  are  to  plead 


6 

his  cause.  And  this  is  peculiarly  our  duty,  because 
we  have  bound  ourselves  to  resist  his  efforts  for  his 
own  emancipation.  We  suffer  him  to  do  noth 
ing  for  himself.  The  more,  then,  should  be  done 
for  him.  Our  physical  power  is  pledged  against 
him  in  case  of  revolt.  Then  our  moral  power 
should  be  exerted  for  his  relief.  His  weakness, 
which  we  increase,  gives  him  a  claim  to  the  only 
aid  we  can  afford,  to  our  moral  sympathy,  to  the 
free  and  faithful  exposition  of  his  wrongs.  As 
men,  as  Christians,  as  citizens,  we  have  duties  to 
the  slave,  as  well  as  to  every  other  member  of  the 
community.  On  this  point  we  have  no  liberty. 
The  Eternal  Law  binds  us  to  take  the  side  of  the 
injured  ;  and  this  law  is  peculiarly  obligatory,  when 
we  forbid  him  to  lift  an  arm  in  his  own  defence. 

Let  it  not  be  said  we  can  do  nothing  for  the 
slave.  We  can  do  much.  We  have  a  power 
mightier  than  armies,  the  power  of  truth,  of  princi 
ple,  of  virtue,  of  right,  of  religion,  of  love.  We 
have  a  power,  which  is  growing  with  every  advance 
of  civilization,  before  which  the  slave-trade  has 
fallen,  which  is  mitigating  the  sternest  despotisms, 
which  is  spreading  education  through  ell  ranks  of 
society,  which  is  bearing  Christianity  to  the  ends 
of  the  earth,  which  carries  in  itself  the  pledge  of 
destruction  to  every  institution  which  debases 
humanity.  Who  can  measure  the  power  of  Chris 
tian  philanthropy,  of  enlightened  goodness,  pour- 


ing  itself  forth  in  prayers  and  persuasions,  from  the 
press  and  pulpit,  from  the  lips  and  hearts  of  devo 
ted  men,  and  more  and  more  binding  together 
the  wise  and  good  in  the  cause  of  their  race  ?  All 
other  powers  may  fail.  This  must  triumph.  It 
is  leagued  with  God's  omnipotence.  It  is  God 
himself  acting  in  the  hearts  of  his  children.  It  has 
an  ally  in  every  conscience,  in  every  human 
breast,  in  the  wrong  doer  himself.  This  spirit  has 
but  begun  its  work  on  earth.  It  is  breathing  itself 
more  and  more  through  literature,  education,  insti 
tutions,  and  opinion.  Slavery  cannot  stand  before 
it.  Great  moral  principles,  pure  and  generous 
sentiments,  cannot  be  confined  to  this  or  that  spot. 
They  cannot  be  shut  out  by  territorial  lines,  or 
local  legislation.  They  are  divine  inspirations, 
and  partake  of  the  omnipresence  of  their  Author. 
The  deliberate,  solemn  conviction  of  good  men 
through  the  world,  that  slavery  is  a  grievous  wrong 
to  human  nature,  will  make  itself  felt.  To  increase 
this  moral  power  is  every  man's  duty.  To  em 
body  and  express  this  great  truth  is  in  every  man's 
power ;  and  thus  every  man  can  do  something  to 
break  the  chain  of  the  slave. 

There  are  not  a  few  persons,  who,  from  vulgar 
modes  of  thinking,  cannot  be  interested  in  this 
subject.  Because  the  slave  is  a  degraded  being, 
they  think  slavery  a  low  topic,  and  wonder  how  it 
can  excite  the  attention  and  sympathy  of  those 


8 

who  can  discuss  or  feel  for  any  thing  else.  Now 
the  truth'  is,  that  slavery,  regarded  only  in  a 
philosophical  light,  is  a  theme  worthy  of  the 
highest  minds.  It  involves  the  gravest  questions 
about  human  nature  and  society.  It  carries  us 
into  the  problems  which  have  exercised  for  ages 
the  highest  understandings.  It  calls  us  to  inquire 
into  the  foundation,  nature,  and  extent  of  human 
rights,  into  the  distinction  between  a  person  and 
a  thing,  into  the  true  relations  of  man  and  man, 
into  the  obligations  of  the  community  to  each 
of  its  members,  into  the  ground  and  laws  of 
property,  and  above  all  into  the  true  dignity  and 
indestructible  claims  of  a  moral  being.  I  venture 
to  say,  there  is  no  subject,  now  agitated  by  the 
community,  which  can  compare*  in  philosophical 
dignity  with  slavery  ;  and  yet  to  multitudes  the 
question  falls  under  the  same  contempt  with  the 
slave  himself.  To  many,  a  writer  seems  to  lower 
himself  who  touches  it.  The  falsely  refined, 
who  want  intellectual  force  to  grasp  it,  pronounce 
it  unworthy  of  their  notice. 

But  this  subject  has  more  than  philosophical 
dignity.  It  has  an  important  bearing  on  character. 
Our  interest  in  it  is  one  test  by  which  our  com 
prehension  of  the  distinctive  spirit  of  Christianity 
must  be  judged.  Christianity  is  the  manifestation 
and  inculcation  of  Universal  Love.  The  great 
teaching  of  Christianity  is,  that  we  must  recognise 


9 

and  respect  human  nature  in  all  its  forms,  in  the 
poorest,  most  ignorant,  most  fallen.  We  must 
look  beneath  "  the  flesh,"  to  "  the  spirit."  The 
Spiritual  principle  in  man  is  what  entitles  him  to 
our  brotherly  regard.  To  be  just  to  this  is  the 
great  injunction  of  our  religion.  To  overlook  this, 
on  account  of  condition  or  color,  is  to  violate  the 
great  Christian  law.  We  have  reason  to  think 
that  it  is  one  design  of  God,  in  appointing  the 
vast  diversities  of  human  condition,  to  put  to  the 
test  and  to  bring  out  most  distinctly  the  principle 
of  love.  It  is  wisely  ordered,  that  human  nature 
is  not  set  before  us  in  a  few  forms  of  beauty, 
magnificence,  and  outward  glory.  To  be  dazzled 
and  attracted  by  these  would  be  no  sign  of 
reverence  for  what  is  interior  and  spiritual  in 
human  nature.  To  lead  us  to  discern  and  love 
this,  we  are  brought  into  connexion  with  fellow7- 
creatures,  whose  outward  circumstances  are  re 
pulsive.  To  recognise  our  own  spiritual  nature  and 
God's  image  in  these  humble  forms,  to  recognise  as 
brethren  those  who  want  all  outward  distinctions, 
is  the  chief  way  in  which  we  are  to  manifest  the 
spirit  of  Him,  who  came  to  raise  the  fallen  and  to 
save  the  lost.  We  see,  then,  the  moral  importance 
of  the  question  of  slavery  ;  according  to  our  deci 
sion  of  it,  we  determine  our  comprehension  of  the 
Christian  law.  He  who  cannot  see  a  brother,  a 
child  of  God,  a  man  possessing  all  the  rights  of 


10 

humanity  under  a  skin  darker  than  his  own,  wants 
the  vision  of  a  Christian.  He  worships  the  Out 
ward.  The  Spirit  is  not  yet  revealed  to  him. 
To  look  unmoved  on  the  degradation  and  wrongs 
of  a  fellow-creature,  because  burned  by  a  fiercer 
sun,  proves  us  strangers  to  justice  and  love,  in 
those  universal  forms  which  characterize  Chris 
tianity.  The  greatest  of  all  distinctions,  the  only 
enduring  one,  is  moral  goodness,  virtue,  religion. 
Outward  distinctions  cannot  add  to  the  dignity  of 
this.  The  wealth  of  worlds  is  "  not  sufficient  for 
a  burnt-offering"  on  its  altar.  A  being  capable  of 
this  is  invested  by  God  with  solemn  claims  on  his 
fellow-creatures.  To  exclude  millions  of  such 
beings  from  our  sympathy,  because  of  outward  dis 
advantages,  proves,  that,  in  whatever  else  we  surpass 
them,  we  are  not  their  superiors  in  Christian  virtue. 
The  spirit  of  Christianity,  I  have  said,  is  distin 
guished  by  Universality.  It  is  universal  justice. 
It  respects  all  the  rights  of  all  beings.  It  suffers 
no  being,  however  obscure,  to  be  wronged,  with 
out  condemning  the  wrong  doer.  Impartial,  un 
compromising,  fearless,  it  screens  no  favorites,  is 
dazzled  by  no  power,  spreads  its  shield  over  the 
weakest,  summons  the  mightiest  to  its  bar,  and 
speaks  to  the  conscience  in  tones,  under  which  the 
mightiest  have  quailed.  It  is  also  universal  love, 
comprehending  those  that  are  near  and  those  that 
are  far  off,  the  high  and  the  low,  the  rich  and 


11 


poor,  descending  to  the  fallen,  and  especially 
binding  itself  to  those  in  whom  human  nature 
is  trampled  under  foot.  Such  is  the  spirit  of 
Christianity ;  and  nothing  but  the  illumination  of 
this  spirit  can  prepare  us  to  pass  judgment  on 
slavery. 

These  remarks  are  intended  to  show  the  spirit 
in  which  slavery  ought  to  be  approached,  and  the 
point  of  view  from  which  it  will  be  regarded  in 
the  present  discussion.  My  plan  may  be  briefly 
sketched. 

1.  I   shall    show    that    man   cannot    be   justly 
held  and  used  as  Property. 

2.  I  shall  show  that  man  has  sacred  and  infalli 
ble  rights,  of  which  slavery  is  the  infraction. 

3.  I  shall   offer  some  explanations  to  prevent 
misapplication  of  these  principles. 

4.  I  shall  unfold  the  evils  of  slavery. 

5.  I  shall   consider   the    argument   which    the 
Scriptures  are  thought  to  furnish  in  favor  of  slavery. 

6.  I   shall  offer  some  remarks  on  the  means  of 
removing  it. 

7.  I  shall  offer  some  remarks  on  abolitionism. 

8.  I  shall  conclude  with  a  few  reflections  on  the 
duties  belonging  to  the  times. 

In  the  first  two  sections  I  propose  to  show  that 
slavery  is  a  great  wrong,  but  I  do  not  intend  to 
pass  sentence  on  the  character  of  the  slave-holder. 
These  two  subjects  are  distinct.  Men  are  not 


always  to  be  interpreted  by  their  acts  or  institu 
tions.  The  same  acts  in  different  circumstances 
admit  and  even  require  very  different  construc 
tions.  I  offer  this  remark,  that  the  subject  may 
be  approached  without  prejudice  or  personal  ref 
erence.  The  single  object  is  to  settle  great  prin 
ciples.  Their  bearing  on  individuals  will  be  a 
subject  of  distinct  consideration. 


CHAPTER    I. 


PROPERTY. 

THE  slave-holder  claims  the  slave  as  his  Prop 
erty.  The  very  idea  of  a  slave  is,  that  he  belongs 
to  another,  that  he  is  bound  to  live  and  labor  for 
another,  to  be  another's  instrument,  and  to  make 
another's  will  his  habitual  law,  however  adverse  to 
his  own.  Another  owns  him,  and  of  course  has  a 
right  to  his  time  and  strength,  a  right  to  the  fruits 
of  his  labor,  a  right  to  task  him  without  his  consent, 
and  to  determine  the  kind  and  duration  of  his  toil, 
a  right  to  confine  him  to  any  bounds,  a  right  to 
extort  the  required  work  by  stripes,  a  right,  in  a 
word,  to  use  him  as  a  tool,  without  contract,  against 
his  will,  and  in  denial  of  his  right  to  dispose  of 
himself  or  to  use  his  power  for  his  own  good. 
"  A  slave,"  says  the  Louisiana  Code,  "  is  in  the 
power  of  the  master  to  whom  he  belongs.  The 
master  may  sell  him,  dispose  of  his  person,  his 
industry,  his  labor  ;  he  can  do  nothing,  possess 
nothing,  nor  acquire  any  thing,  but  which  must 
belong  to  his  master."  "  Slaves  shall  be  deemed, 
taken,  reputed,  and  adjudged,"  say  the  South 


14 

Carolina  laws,  "  to  be  chattels  personal  in  the 
hands  of  their  masters,  and  possessions  to  all 
intents  and  purposes  whatsoever."  Such  is  sla 
very,  a  claim  to  man  as  property. 

Now  this  claim  of  property  in  a  human  being  is 
altogether  false,  groundless.  No  such  right  of 
man  in  man  can  exist.  A  human  being  cannot 
be  justly  owned.  To  hold  and  treat  him  as  prop 
erty  is  to  inflict  a  great  wrong,  to  incur  the  guilt 
of  oppression. 

This  position  there  is  a  difficulty  in  maintaining 
on  account  of  its  exceeding  obviousness.  It  is  too 
plain  for  proof.  To  defend  it  is  like  trying  to 
confirm  a  self-evident  truth.  To  find  arguments 
is  not  easy,  because  an  argument  is  something 
clearer  than  the  proposition  to  be  sustained.  The 
man,  who,  on  hearing  the  claim  to  property  in  man, 
does  not  see  and  feel  distinctly  that  it  is  a  cruel 
usurpation,  is  hardly  to  be  reached  by  reasoning, 
for  it  is  hard  to  find  any  plainer  principles  than 
what  he  begins  with  denying.  I  will  endeavour, 
however,  to  illustrate  the  truth  which  I  have 
stated. 

1.  It  is  plain,  that,  if  one  man  may  be  held  as 
property,  then  every  other  man  may  be  so  held. 
If  there  be  nothing  in  human  nature,  in  our 
common  nature,  which  excludes  and  forbids  the 
conversion  of  him  who  possesses  it  into  an  article 


15 


of  property ;  if  the  right  of  the  free  to  liberty  is 
founded,  not  on  their  essential  attributes  as  rational 
and  moral  beings,  but  on  certain  adventitious, 
accidental  circumstances,  into  which  they  have 
been  thrown  ;  then  every  human  being,  by  a 
change  of  circumstances,  may  justly  be  held  and 
treated  by  another  as  property.  If  one  man  may 
be  rightfully  reduced  to  slavery,  then  there  is  not 
a  human  being  on  whom  the  same  chain  may  not 
be  imposed.  Now  let  every  reader  ask  himself 
this  plain  question  :  Could  I,  can  I,  be  rightfully 
seized,  and  made  an  article  of  property;  be  made 
a  passive  instrument  of  another's  will  and  pleasure  ; 
be  subjected  to  another's  irresponsible  power ;  be 
subjected  to  stripes  at  another's  will  ;  be  denied  the 
control  and  use  of  my  own  limbs  and  faculties  for 
my  own  good  ?  Does  any  man,  so  questioned, 
doubt,  waver,  look  about  him  for  an  answer?  Is 
not  the  reply  given  immediately,  intuitively,  by  his 
whole  inward  being  ?  Does  not  an  unhesitating, 
unerring  conviction  spring  up  in  my  breast,  that  no 
other  man  can  acquire  such  a  right  in  myself? 
Do  we  not  repel  indignantly  and  with  horror  the 
thought  of  being  reduced  to  the  condition  oi  tools 
and  chattels  to  a  fellow-creature  ?  Is  there  any 
moral  truth  more  deeply  rooted  in  us,  than  that 
such  a  degradation  would  be  an  infinite  wrong? 
And  if  this  impression  be  a  delusion,  on  what 
single  moral  conviction  can  we  rely  ?  This  deep 


16 


assurance,  that  we  cannot  be  rightfully  made 
another's  property,  does  not  rest  on  the  hue  of  our 
skins,  or  the  place  of  our  birth,  or  our  strength,  or 
wealth.  These  things  do  not  enter  our  thoughts. 
The  consciousness  of  indestructible  rights  is  a 
part  of  our  moral  being.  The  consciousness  of 
our  humanity  involves  the  persuasion,  that  we 
cannot  be  owned  as  a  tree  or  a  brute.  As  men 
we  cannot  justly  be  made  slaves.  Then  no  man 
can  be  rightfully  enslaved.  In  casting  the  yoke 
from  ourselves  as  an  unspeakable  wrong,  we  con 
demn  ourselves  as  wrong  doers  and  oppressors  in 
laying  it  on  any  who  share  our  nature.  It  is  not 
necessary  to  inquire  whether  a  man,  by  extreme 
guilt,  may  not  forfeit  the  right  of  his  nature,  and 
be  justly  punished  with  slavery.  On  this  point 
crude  notions  prevail.  But  the  discussion  would 
be  foreign  to  the  present  subject.  We  are  now 
not  speaking  of  criminals.  We  speak  of  innocent 
men,  who  have  given  us  no  hold  on  them  by 
guilt ;  and  our  own  consciousness  is  a  proof,  that 
such  cannot  rightfully  be  seized  as  property  by  a 
fellow-creature. 

2.  A  man  cannot  be  seized  and  held  as  prop 
erty,  because  he  has  Rights.  Wliat  these  rights 
are,  whether  few  or  many,  or  whether  all  men 
have  the  same,  are  questions  for  future  discussion. 
All  that  is  assumed  now  is,  that  every  human 


17 

being  has  some  rights.  This  truth  cannot  be 
denied,  but  by  denying  to  a  portion  of  the  race 
that  moral  nature  which  is  the  sure  and  only 
foundation  of  rights.  This  truth  has  never,  I 
believe,  been  disputed.  It  is  even  recognised  in  the 
very  codes  of  slave-legislation,  which,  while  they 
strip  a  man  of  liberty,  affirm  his  right  to  life,  and 
threaten  his  murderer  with  punishment.  Now,  I 
say  a  being  having  rights  cannot  justly  be  made 
property  ;  for  this  claim  over  him  virtually  annuls 
all  his  rights.  It  strips  him  of  all  power  to  assert 
them.  It  makes  it  a  crime  to  assert  them.  The 
very  essence  of  slavery  is,  to  put  a  man  defence 
less  into  the  hands  of  another.  The  right  claimed 
by  the  master,  to  task,  to  force,  to  imprison,  to 
whip,  and  to  punish  the  slave,  at  discretion,  and 
especially  to  prevent  the  least  resistance  to  his  will, 
is  a  virtual  denial  and  subversion  of  all  the  rights 
of  the  victim  of  his  power.  The  two  cannot  stand 
together.  Can  we  doubt  which  of  them  ought  to 
fall? 

3.  Another  argument  against  property  is  to  be 
found  in  the  Essential  Equality  of  men.  I  know 
that  this  doctrine,  so  venerable  in  the  eyes  of  our 
fathers,  has  lately  been  denied.  Verbal  logicians 
have  told  us  that  men  are  "  born  equal,"  only 
in  the  sense  of  being  equally  born.  They  have 
asked  whether  all  are  equally  tall,  strong,  or  beauti- 
2 


18 

fill ;  or  whether  nature,  Procrustes-like,  reduces  all 
her  children  to  one  standard  of  intellect  and  virtue. 
By  such  arguments  it  is  attempted  to  set  aside  the 
principle  of  equality,  on  which  the  soundest  moralists 
have  reared  the  structure  of  social  duty;  and  in 
these  ways  the  old  foundations  of  despotic  power, 
which  our  fathers  in  their  simplicity  thought  they 
had  subverted,  are  laid  again  by  their  sons. 

It  is  freely  granted,  that  there  are  innumerable 
diversities  among  men  ;  but  be  it  remembered, 
they  are  ordained  to  bind  men  together,  and  not  to 
subdue  one  to  the  other;  ordained  to  give  means 
and  occasions  of  mutual  aid,  and  to  carry  forward 
each  and  all,  so  that  the  good  of  all  is  equally 
intended  in  this  distribution  of  various  gifts.  Be 
it  also  remembered,  that  these  diversities  among 
men  are  as  nothing  in  comparison  with  the  attri 
butes  in  which  they  agree,  and  it  is  this  which 
constitutes  their  essential  equality.  All  men  have 
the  same  rational  nature,  and  the  same  power  of 
conscience,  and  all  are  equally  made  for  indefinite 
improvement  of  these  divine  faculties,  and  for  the 
happiness  to  be  found  in  their  virtuous  use.  Who, 
that  comprehends  these  gifts,  does  not  see  that  the 
diversities  of  the  race  vanish  before  them  ?  Let 
it  be  added,  that  the  natural  advantages,  which 
distinguish  one  man  from  another,  are  so  bestowed 
as  to  counterbalance  one  another,  and  bestowed 
without  regard  to  rank  or  condition  in  life.  Who- 


19 

ever  surpasses  in  one  endowment  is  inferior  in 
others.  Even  genius,  the  greatest  gift,  is  found 
in  union  with  strange  infirmities,  and  often  places  its 
possessors  below  ordinary  men  in  the  conduct  of 
life.  Great  learning  is  often  put  to  shame  by  the 
mother-wit  and  keen  good  sense  of  uneducated 
men.  Nature,  indeed,  pays  no  heed  to  birth  or 
condition  in  bestowing  her  favors.  The  noblest 
spirits  sometimes  grow  up  in  the  obscurest  spheres. 
Thus  equal  are  men  ;  and  among  these  equals, 
who  can  substantiate  his  claim  to  make  others  his 
property,  his  tools,  the  mere  instruments  of  his 
private  interest  and  gratification  ?  Let  this  claim 
begin,  and  where  will  it  stop?  If  one  may  assert 
it,  why  not  all  ?  Among  these  partakers  of  the 
same  rational  and  moral  nature,  who  can  make 
good  a  right  over  others,  which  others  may  not 
establish  over  himself  ?  Does  he  insist  on  superior 
strength  of  body  or  mind  ?  Who  of  us  has  no 
superior  in  one  or  the  other  of  these  endowments  : 
Is  it  sure  that  the  slave  or  the  slave's  child  may 
not  surpass  his  master  in  intellectual  energy  or  in 
moral  worth  ?  Has  nature  conferred  distinctions 
which  tell  us  plainly,  who  shall  be  owners 
and  who  be  owned  ?  Who  of  us  can  unblush- 
ingly  lift  his  head  and  say  that  God  has  written 
"  Master "  there  ?  or  who  can  show  the  word 
"  Slave"  engraven  on  his  brother's  brow  ?  The 
equality  of  nature  makes  slavery  a  wrong.  Na- 


20 

lure's  seal  is  affixed  to  no  instrument,  by  which 
property  in  a  single  human  being  is  conveyed. 

4.  That  a  human  being  cannot  be  justly  held 
and  used  as  property  is  apparent  from  the  very 
nature  of  property.  Property  is  an  exclusive, 
single  right.  It  shuts  out  all  claim  but  that 
of  the  possessor.  What  one  man  owns  cannot 
belong  to  another.  What,  then,  is  the  consequence 
of  holding  a  human  being  as  property  ?  Plainly 
this.  He  can  have  no  right  to  himself.  His 
limbs  are,  in  truth,  not  morally  his  own.  He  has 
not  a  right  to  his  own  strength.  It  belongs  to 
another.  His  will,  intellect,  and  muscles,  all  the 
powers  of  body  and  mind  which  are  exercised  in 
labor,  he  is  bound  to  regard  as  another's.  Now,  if 
there  be  property  in  any  thing,  it  is  that  of  a  man 
in  his  own  person,  mind,  and  strength.  All  other 
rights  are  weak,  unmeaning,  compared  with  this, 
and  in  denying  this  all  right  is  denied.  It  is  true 
that  an  individual  may  forfeit  by  crime  his  right 
to  the  use  of  his  limbs,  perhaps  to  his  limbs,  and 
even  to  life.  But  the  very  idea  of  forfeiture 
implies  that  the  right  was  originally  possessed.  It 
is  true  that  a  man  may  by  contract  give  to  another 
a  limited  right  to  his  strength.  But  he  gives  only 
because  he  possesses  it,  and  gives  it  for  considera 
tions  which  he  deems  beneficial  to  himself;  and 
the  right  conferred  ceases  at  once  on  violation  of 


21 

the  conditions  on  which  it  was  bestowed.  To 
deny  the  right  of  a  human  being  to  himself,  to  his 
own  limbs  and  faculties,  to  his  energy  of  body  and 
mind,  is  an  absurdity  too  gross  to  be  confuted  by 
any  thing  but  a  simple  statement.  Yet  this  ab 
surdity  is  involved  in  the  idea  of  his  belonging  to 
another. 

5.  We  have  a  plain  recognition  of  the  principle 
now  laid  down,  in  the  universal  indignation  ex 
cited  towards  a  man  who  makes  another  his  slave. 
Our  laws  know  no  higher  crime  than  that  of  re 
ducing  a  man  to  slavery.  To  steal  or  to  buy  an 
African  on  his  own  shores  is  piracy.  In  this  act 
the  greatest  wrong  is  inflicted,  the  most  sacred 
right  violated.  But  if  a  human  being  cannot 
without  infinite  injustice  be  seized  as  property, 
then  he  cannot  without  equal  wrong  be  held  and 
used  as  such.  The  wrong  in  the  first  seizure  lies 
in  the  destination  of  a  human  being  to  future 
bondage,  to  the  criminal  use  of  him  as  a  chattel 
or  brute.  Can  that  very  use,  which  makes  the 
original  seizure  an  enormous  wrong,  become  grad 
ually  innocent  ?  If  the  slave  receive  injury  with 
out  measure  at  the  first  moment  of  the  outrage,  is 
he  less  injured  by  being  held  fast  the  second  or  the 
third  ?  Does  the  duration  of  wrong,  the  increase 
of  it  by  continuance,  convert  it  into  right  ?  It  is 
true,  in  many  cases,  that  length  of  possession 


22 

is  considered  as  giving  a  right,  where  the  goods 
were  acquired  by  unlawful  means.  But  in  these 
cases  the  goods  were  such  as  might  justly  be 
appropriated  to  individual  use.  They  were  in 
tended  by  the  Creator  to  be  owned.  They  fulfil 
their  purpose  by  passing  into  the  hands  of  an 
exclusive  possessor.  It  is  essential  to  rightful 
property  in  a  thing,  that  the  thing  from  its  nature 
may  be  rightfully  appropriated.  If  it  cannot 
originally  be  made  one's  own  without  crime,  it 
certainly  cannot  be  continued  as  such  without 
guilt.  Now,  the  ground,  on  which  the  seizure  of 
the  African  on  his  own  shore  is  condemned,  is, 
that  he  is  a  Man,  who  has  by  his  nature  a  right  to 
be  free.  Ought  not,  then,  the  same  condemnation 
to  light  on  the  continuance  of  his  yoke  ?  Still 
more.  Whence  is  it  that  length  of  possession  is 
considered  by  the  laws  as  conferring  a  right  ?  I 
answer,  from  the  difficulty  of  determining  the 
original  proprietor,  and  from  the  apprehension  of 
unsettling  all  property  by  carrying  back  inquiry 
beyond  a  certain  time.  Suppose,  however,  an 
article  of  property  to  be  of  such  a  nature  that  it 
could  bear  the  name  of  the  true  original  owner, 
stamped  on  it  in  bright  and  indelible  characters. 
In  this  case,  the  whole  ground,  on  which  length 
of  possession  bars  other  claims,  would  fail.  The 
proprietor  would  not  be  concealed  or  rendered 
doubtful  by  the  lapse  of  time.  Would  not  he, 


23 

who  should  receive  such  an  article  from  a  robber 
or  a  succession  of  robbers,  be  involved  in  their 
guilt?  Now,  the  true  owner  of  a  human  being  is 
made  manifest  to  all.  It  is  Himself.  No  brand 
on  the  slave  was  ever  so  conspicuous  as  the 
mark  of  property  which  God  has  set  on  him. 
God,  in  making  him  a  rational  and  moral  being, 
has  put  a  glorious  stamp  on  him,  which  all  the 
slave-legislation  and  slave-markets  of  worlds  can 
not  efface.  Hence  no  right  accrues  to  the  master 
from  the  length  of  the  wrong  which  has  been  done 
to  the  slave. 

6.  Another  argument  against  the  right  of  prop 
erty  in  man  may  be  drawn  from  a  very  obvious 
principle  of  moral  science.  It  is  a  plain  truth, 
universally  received,  that  every  right  supposes  or 
involves  a  corresponding  Obligation.  If,  then,  a 
man  has  a  right  to  another's  person  or  powers, 
the  latter  is  under  obligation  to  give  himself  up  as 
a  chattel  to  the  former.  This  is  his  Duty.  He  is 
bound  to  be  a  slave ;  and  bound  not  merely 
by  the  Christian  law  which  enjoins  submission 
to  injury,  not  merely  by  prudential  considerations, 
or  by  the  claims  of  public  order  and  peace  ;  but 
bound  because  another  has  a  right  of  Ownership, 
has  a  Moral  claim  to  him,  so  that  he  would  be 
guilty  of  dishonesty,  of  robbery,  in  withdrawing 
himself  from  this  other's  service.  It  is  his  Duty 


24 

to  work  for  his  master,  though  all  compulsion  were 
withdrawn  ;  and  in  deserting  him  he  would  commit 
the  crime  of  taking  away  another  man's  property, 
as  truly  as  if  he  were  to  carry  off  his  owner's 
purse.  Now,  do  we  not  instantly  feel,  can  we 
help  feeling,  that  this  is  false  ?  Is  the  slave  thus 
morally  bound  ?  When  the  African  was  first 
brought  to  these  shores,  would  he  have  violated  a 
solemn  obligation,  by  slipping  his  chain,  and  flying 
back  to  his  native  home  ?  Would  he  not  have 
been  bound  to  seize  the  precious  opportunity  of 
escape  ?  Is  the  slave  under  a  moral  obligation 
to  confine  himself,  his  wife,  and  children,  to  a  spot 
where  their  union  in  a  moment  may  be  forcibly 
dissolved?  Ought  he  not,  if  he  can,  to  place 
himself  and  his  family  under  the  guardianship  of 
equal  laws  ?  Should  we  blame  him  for  leaving 
his  yoke  ?  Do  we  not  feel,  that,  in  the  same 
condition,  a  sense  of  duty  would  quicken  our  flying 
steps  ?  Where,  then,  is  the  obligation  which  would 
necessarily  be  imposed,  if  the  right  existed  which 
the  master  claims  ?  The  absence  of  obligation 
proves  the  want  of  the  right.  The  claim  is 
groundless.  It  is  a  cruel  wrong. 

7.  I  come  now  to  what  is  to  my  own  mind  the 
great  argument  against  seizing  and  using  a  man  as 
property.  He  cannot  be  property  in  the  sight  of 
God  and  justice,  because  he  is  a  Rational,  Moral, 


25 

Immortal  Being ;  because  created  in  God's  image, 
and  therefore  in  the  highest  sense  his  child  ;  be 
cause  created  to  unfold  Godlike  faculties,  and  to 
govern  himself  by  a  Divine  Law  written  on  his 
heart,  and  republished  in  God's  Word.  His  whole 
nature  forbids  that  he  should  be  seized  as  prop 
erty.  From  his  very  nature  it  follows,  that  so  to 
seize  him  is  to  offer  an  insult  to  his  Maker,  and  to 
inflict  aggravated  social  wrong.  Into  every  human 
being  God  has  breathed  an  immortal  spirit  more 
precious  than  the  whole  outward  creation.  No 
earthly  or  celestial  language  can  exaggerate  the 
worth  of  a  human  being.  No  matter  how  obscure 
his  condition.  Thought,  Reason,  Conscience,  the 
capacity  of  Virtue,  the  capacity  of  Christian  Love, 
an  Immortal  Destiny,  an  intimate  moral  connexion 
with  God,  —  here  are  attributes  of  our  common  hu 
manity  which  reduce  to  insignificance  all  outward 
distinctions,  and  make  every  human  being  un 
speakably  dear  to  his  Maker.  No  matter  how 
ignorant  he  may  be.  The  capacity  of  Improve 
ment  allies  him  to  the  more  instructed  of  his 
race,  and  places  within  his  reach  the  knowledge 
and  happiness  of  higher  worlds.  Every  human 
being  has  in  him  the  germ  of  the  greatest  Idea  in 
the  universe,  the  Idea  of  God  ;  and  to  unfold  this 
is  the  end  of  his  existence.  Every  human  being 
has  in  his  breast  the  elements  of  that  Divine, 
Everlasting  Law,  which  the  highest  orders  of  the 


26 

creation  obey.  Jle  has  the  Idea  of  Duty  ;  and  to 
unfold,  revere,  obey  this  is  the  very  purpose  for 
which  life  was  given.  Every  human  being  has 
the  Idea  of  what  is  meant  by  that  word,  Truth  ; 
that  is,  he  sees,  however  dimly,  the  great  object  of 
Divine  and  created  intelligence,  and  is  capable  of 
ever-enlarging  perceptions  of  Truth.  Every  hu 
man  being  has  affections,  which  may  be  purified 
and  expanded  into  a  Sublime  Love.  He  has,  too, 
the  Idea  of  Happiness,  and  a  thirst  for  it  which 
cannot  be  appeased.  Such  is  our  nature.  Wherever 
we  see  a  man,  we  see  the  possessor  of  these  great 
capacities.  Did  God  make  such  a  being  to  be 
owned  as  a  tree  or  a  brute  ?  How  plainly  was  he 
made  to  exercise,  unfold,  improve  his  highest  pow 
ers,  made  for  a  moral,  spiritual  good  !  and  how  is 
he  wronged,  and  his  Creator  opposed,  when  he  is 
forced  and  broken  into  a  tool  to  another's  physical 
enjoyment ! 

Such  a  being  was  plainly  made  for  an  End  in 
Himself.  He  is  a  Person,  not  a  Thing.  He  is  an 
End,  not  a  mere  Instrument  or  Means.  He  was 
made  for  his  own  virtue  and  happiness.  Is  this 
end  reconcilable  with  his  being  held  and  used  as 
a  chattel  ?  The  sacrifice  of  such  a  being  to 
another's  will,  to  another's  present,  outward,  ill- 
comprehended  good,  is  the  greatest  violence  which 
can  be  offered  to  any  creature  of  God.  It  is  to 
degrade  him  from  his  rank  in  the  universe,  to  make 


27 

him  a  means,  not  an  end,  to  cast  him  out  from  God's 
spiritual  family  into  the  brutal  herd. 

Such  a  being  was  plainly  made  to  obey  a  Law 
within  Himself.  This  is  the  essence  of  a  moral 
being.  He  possesses,  as  a  part  of  his  nature,  and 
the  most  essential  part,  a  sense  of  Duty,  which 
he  is  to  reverence  and  follow,  in  opposition  to  all 
pleasure  or  pain,  to  all  interfering  human  wills. 
The  great  purpose  of  all  good  education  and  dis 
cipline  is,  to  make  a  man  Master  of  Himself,  to 
excite  him  to  act  from  a  principle  in  his  own  mind, 
to  lead  him  to  propose  his  own  perfection  as  his 
supreme  law  and  end.  And  is  this  highest  pur 
pose  of  man's  nature  to  be  reconciled  with  entire 
subjection  to  a  foreign  will,  to  an  outward,  over 
whelming  force,  which  is  satisfied  with  nothing  but 
complete  submission  ? 

The  end  of  such  a  being  as  we  have  described 
is  manifestly  Improvement.  Now,  it  is  the  funda 
mental  law  of  our  nature,  that  all  our  powers  are 
to  improve  by  free  exertion.  Action  is  the  indis 
pensable  condition  of  progress  to  the  intellect,  con 
science,  and  heart.  Is  it  not  plain,  then,  that  a 
human  being  cannot,  without  wrong,  be  owned  by 
another,  who  claims,  as  proprietor,  the  right  to 
repress  the  powers  of  his  slaves,  to  withhold  from 
them  the  means  of  development,  to  keep  them  with 
in  the  limits  which  are  necessary  to  contentment  in 
chains,  to  shut  out  every  ray  of  light  and  every 


28 

generous  sentiment,  which  may  interfere  with  entire 
subjection  to  his  will  ? 

No  man,  who  seriously  considers  what  human 
nature  is,  and  what  it  was  made  for,  can  think  of 
setting  up  a  claim  to  a  fellow-creature.  What ! 
own  a  spiritual  being,  a  being  made  to  know  and 
adore  God,  and  who  is  to  outlive  the  sun  and 
stars !  What !  chain  to  our  lowest  uses  a  beino- 

O 

made  for  truth  and  virtue  !  Convert  into  a  brute 
instrument  that  intelligent  nature  on  which  the 
Idea  of  Duty  has  dawned,  and  which  is  a  nobler 
type  of  God  than  all  outward  creation  !  Should 
we  not  deem  it  a  wrong  which  no  punishment 
could  expiate,  were  one  of  our  children  seized  as 
property,  and  driven  by  the  whip  to  toil  ?  And 
shall  God's  child,  dearer  to  him  than  an  only  son 
to  a  human  parent,  be  thus  degraded  ?  Every 
thing  else  may  be  owned  in  the  universe ;  but  a 
moral,  rational  being  cannot  be  property.  Suns 
and  stars  may  be  owned,  but  not  the  lowest  spirit. 
Touch  any  thing  but  this.  Lay  not  your  hand  on 
God's  rational  offspring.  The  whole  spiritual 
world  cries  out,  Forbear !  The  highest  intelli 
gences  recognise  their  own  nature,  their  own  rights, 
in  the  humblest  human  being.  By  that  priceless, 
immortal  spirit  which  dwells  in  him,  by  that  like 
ness  of  God  which  he  wears,  tread  him  not  in  the 
dust,  confound  him  not  with  the  brute. 


29 

We  have  thus  seen  that  a  human  being  cannot 
rightfully  be  held  and  used  as  property.  No  legis 
lation,  not  that  of  all  countries  or  worlds,  could 
make  him  so.  Let  this  be  laid  clown,  as  a  first, 
fundamental  truth.  Let  us  hold  it  fast,  as  a  most 
sacred,  precious  truth.  Let  us  hold  it  fast  against 
all  customs,  all  laws,  all  rank,  wealth,  and  power. 
Let  it  be  armed  with  the  whole  authority  of  the 
civilized  and  Christian  world. 

I  have  taken  it  for  granted  that  no  reader  would 
be  so  wanting  in  moral  discrimination  and  moral 
feeling,  as  to  urge  that  men  may  rightfully  be  seized 
and  held  as  property,  because  various  governments 
have  so  ordained.  What !  is  human  legislation  the 
measure  of  right  ?  Are  God's  laws  to  be  repealed 
by  man's?  Can  government  do  no  wrong?  What 
is  the  history  of  human  governments  but  a  record 
of  wrongs  ?  How  much  does  the  progress  of 
civilization  consist  in  the  substitution  of  just  and 
humane,  for  barbarous  and  oppressive  laws  ? 
Government,  indeed,  has  ordained  slavery,  and  to 
government  the  individual  is  in  no  case  to  offer 
resistance.  But  criminal  legislation  ought  to  be 
freely  and  earnestly  exposed.  Injustice  is  never  so 
terrible,  and  never  so  corrupting,  as  when  armed 
with  the  sanctions  of  law.  The  authority  of  gov 
ernment,  instead  of  being  a  reason  for  silence  under 
wrongs,  is  a  reason  for  protesting  against  wrong 
with  the  undivided  energy  of  argument,  entreaty, 
and  solemn  admonition. 


CHAPTER    II. 


RIGHTS. 

I  NOW  proceed  to  the  second  division  of  the  sub 
ject.  I  am  to  show,  that  man  has  by  nature  receiv 
ed  sacred,  inalienable  Rights,  which  are  violated  by 
slavery.  Some  important  principles,  which  belong 
to  this  head,  were  necessarily  anticipated  under  the 
preceding  ;  but  they  need  a  fuller  exposition.  The 
whole  subject  of  Rights  needs  to  be  reconsidered. 
Speculations  and  reasonings  about  it  have  lately 
been  given  to  the  public,  not  only  false,  but  danger 
ous  to  freedom,  and  there  is  a  strong  tendency 
to  injurious  views.  Rights  are  made  to  depend  on 
circumstances,  so  that  pretences  may  easily  be 
made  or  created  for  violating  them  successively, 
till  none  shall  remain.  Human  rights  have  been 
represented  as  so  modified  and  circumscribed  by 
men's  entrance  into  the  social  state,  that  only  the 
shadows  of  them  are  left.  They  have  been  spoken 
of  as  absorbed  in  the  public  good ;  so  that  a  man 
may  be  innocently  enslaved,  if  the  public  good 
shall  so  require.  To  meet  fully  all  these  errors, 


31 

for  such  I  hold  them,  a  larger  work  than  the  pres 
ent  is  required.  The  nature  of  man,  his  relations 
to  the  state,  the  limits  of  civil  government,  the  ele 
ments  of  the  public  good,  and  the  degree  to  which 
the  individual  must  be  surrendered  to  this  good, 
—  these  are  the  topics  which  the  present  subject 
involves.  I  cannot  enter  into  them  particularly, 
but  shall  lay  down  what  seem  to  me  the  great 
and  true  principles  in  regard  to  them.  I  shall 
show  that  man  has  rights  from  his  very  nature,  not 
the  gifts  of  society,  but  of  God  ;  that  they  are  not 
surrendered  on  entering  the  social  state  ;  that  they 
must  not  be  taken  away  under  the  plea  of  public 
good  ;  that  the  Individual  is  never  to  be  sacrificed 
to  the  Community  ;  that  the  Idea  of  Rights  is  to 
prevail  above  all  the  interests  of  the  State. 

Man  has  rights  by  nature.  The  disposition  of 
some  to  deride  abstract  rights,  as  if  all  rights  were 
uncertain,  mutable,  and  conceded  by  society,  shows 
a  lamentable  ignorance  of  human  nature.  Who 
ever  understands  this  must  see  in  it  an  immovable 
foundation  of  rights.  These  are  gifts  of  the  Crea 
tor,  not  grants  of  society.  In  the  order  of  things, 
they  precede  society,  lie  at  its  foundation,  consti 
tute  man's  capacity  for  it,  and  are  the  great  objects 
of  social  institutions.  The  consciousness  of  rights 
is  not  a  creation  of  human  art,  a  conventional  sen 
timent,  but  essential  to  and  inseparable  from  the 
human  soul. 


32 

Man's  rights  belong  to  him  as  a  Moral  Being, 
as  capable  of  perceiving  moral  distinctions,  as  a 
subject  of  moral  obligation.  As  soon  as  he 
becomes  conscious  of  Duty,  a  kindred  conscious 
ness  springs  up,  that  he  has  a  Right  to  do  what 
the  sense  of  duty  enjoins,  and  that  no  foreign  will 
or  power  can  obstruct  his  moral  action  without 
crime.  He  feels  that  the  sense  of  duty  was  given 
to  him  as  a  Law,  that  it  makes  him  responsible  for 
himself,  that  to  exercise,  unfold,  and  obey  it  is  the 
end  of  his  being,  and  that  he  has  a  right  to  exer 
cise  and  obey  it  without  hindrance  or  opposition. 
A  consciousness  of  dignity,  however  obscure,  be 
longs  also  to  this  divine  principle  ;  and  though  he 
may  want  words  to  do  justice  to  his  thoughts,  he 
feels  that  he  has  that  within  him  which  makes 
him  essentially  equal  to  all  around  him. 

The  sense  of  duty  is  the  fountain  of  human 
rights.  In  other  words,  the  same  inward  princi 
ple,  which  teaches  the  former,  bears  witness  to  the 
latter.  Duties  and  Rights  must  stand  or  fall 
together.  It  has  been  too  common  to  oppose 
them  to  one  another;  but  they  are  indissolubly 
joined  together.  That  same  inward  principle, 
which  teaches  a  man  what  he  is  bound  to  do  to 
others,  teaches  equally,  and  at  the  same  instant, 
what  others  are  bound  to  do  to  him.  That 
same  voice,  which  forbids  him  to  injure  a  single 
fellow-creature,  forbids  every  fellow-creature  to  do 


33 


him  barm.  His  conscience,  in  revealing  the  moral 
law,  does  not  reveal  a  law  for  himself  only,  but 
speaks  as  an  Universal  Legislator.  He  has  an 
intuitive  conviction,  that  the  obligations  of  this 
divine  code  press  on  others  as  truly  as  on  himself. 
That  principle,  which  teaches  him  that  he  sustains 
the  relation  of  brotherhood  to  all  human  beings, 
teaches  him  that  this  relation  is  reciprocal,  that  it 
gives  indestructible  claims  as  well  as  imposes 
solemn  duties,  and  that  what  he  owes  to  the 
members  of  this  vast  family,  they  owe  to  him  in 
return.  Thus  the  moral  nature  involves  rights. 
These  enter  into  its  very  essence.  They  are 
taught  by  the  very  voice  which  enjoins  duty. 
Accordingly  there  is  no  deeper  principle  in  human 
nature  than  the  consciousness  of  rights.  So  pro 
found,  so  ineradicable  is  this  sentiment,  that 
the  oppressions  of  ages  have  no  where  wholly 
stifled  it. 

Having  shown  the  foundation  of  human  rights 
in  human  nature,  it  may  be  asked  what  they  are. 
Perhaps  they  do  not  admit  very  accurate  defini 
tion  any  more  than  human  duties;  for  the  Spiritual 
cannot  be  weighed  and  measured  like  the  Mate 
rial.  Perhaps  a  minute  criticism  may  find  fault 
with  the  most  guarded  exposition  of  them ;  but 
they  may  easily  be  stated  in  language  which  the 
unsophisticated  mind  will  recognise  as  the  truth. 
Volumes  could  not  do  justice  to  them  ;  and  yet 
3 


34 

perhaps  they  may  be  comprehended  in  one  sen 
tence.  They  may  all  be  comprised  in  the  Right, 
which  belongs  to  every  rational  being,  to  exercise 
his  powers  for  the  promotion  of  his  own  and 
others'  Happiness  and  Virtue.  These  are  the 
great  purposes  of  his  existence.  For  these  his 
powers  were  given,  and  to  these  he  is  bound  to 
devote  them.  He  is  bound  to  make  himself  and 
others  better  and  happier,  according  to  his  ability. 
His  ability  for  this  work  is  a  sacred  trust  from  God, 
the  greatest  of  all  trusts.  He  must  answer  for 
the  waste  or  abuse  of  it.  He  consequently  suffers 
an  unspeakable  wrong,  when  stripped  of  it  by 
others,  or  forbidden  to  employ  it  for  the  ends  for 
which  it  is  given  ;  when  the  powers  which  God 
has  given  for  such  generous  uses  are  impaired  or 
destroyed  by  others,  or  the  means  for  their  action 
and  growth  are  forcibly  withheld.  As  every  human 
being  is  bound  to  employ  his  faculties  for  his  own 
and  others'  good,  there  is  an  obligation  on  each 
to  leave  all  free  for  the  accomplishment  of  this 
end  ;  and  whoever  respects  this  obligation,  who 
ever  uses  his  own,  without  invading  others'  powers, 
or  obstructing  others'  duties,  has  a  sacred,  inde 
feasible  right  to  be  unassailed,  unobstructed,  un 
harmed  by  all  with  whom  he  may  be  connected. 
Here  is  the  grand,  all-comprehending  right  of 
human  nature.  Every  man  should  revere  it, 
should  assert  it  for  himself  and  for  all,  and  should 


35 

bear  solemn  testimony  against  every  infraction  of 
it,  by  whomsoever  made  or  endured. 

Having  considered  the  great  fundamental  right 
of  human  nature,  particular  rights  may  easily  be 
deduced.  Every  man  has  a  right  to  exercise  and 
invigorate  his  intellect  or  the  power  of  knowledge, 
for  knowledge  is  the  essential  condition  of  sue-  4 
cessful  effort  for  every  good ;  and  whoever  ob 
structs  or  quenches  the  intellectual  life  in  another 
inflicts  a  grievous  and  irreparable  wrong.  Every 
man  has  a  right  to  inquire  into  his  duty,  and  to 
conform  himself  to  what  he  learns  of  it.  Every 
man  has  a  right  to  use  the  means,  given  by  God 
and  sanctioned  by  virtue,  for  bettering  his  condi 
tion.  He  has  a  right  to  be  respected  according  to 
his  moral  worth ;  a  right  to  be  regarded  as  a 
member  of  the  community  to  which  he  belongs, 
and  to  be  protected  by  impartial  laws  ;  and  a  right 
to  be  exempted  from  coercion,  stripes,  and  pun 
ishment,  as  long  as  he  respects  the  rights  of  others. 
He  has  a  right  to  an  equivalent  for  his  labor, 
He  ha?  a  right  to  sustain  domestic  relations,  to 
discharge  their  duties,  and  to  enjoy  the  happiness 
which  flows  from  fidelity  in  these  and  other  do 
mestic  relations.  Such  are  a  few  of  human  rights  ; 
and  if  so,  what  a  grievous  wrong  is  slavery  ! 

Perhaps  nothing  has  done  more  to  impair  the 
sense  of  the  reality  and  sacredness  of  human 
rights,  and  to  sanction  oppression,  than  loose  idea? 


36 

as  to  the  change  made  in  man's  natural  rights  by 
his  entrance  into  civil  society.  It  is  commonly  said 
that  men  part  with  a  portion  of  these  by  becoming 
a  community,  a  body  politic ;  that  government 
consists  of  powers  surrendered  by  the  individual ; 
and  it  is  said,  "  If  certain  rights  and  powers  may 
be  surrendered,  why  not  others?  why  not  all? 
What  limit  is  to  be  set  ?  The  good  of  the  com 
munity,  to  which  a  part  is  given  up,  may  demand 
the  whole ;  and  in  this  good,  all  private  rights  are 
merged."  This  is  the  logic  of  despotism.  We 
are  grieved,  that  it  finds  its  way  into  republics,  and 
that  it  sets  down  the  great  principles  of  freedom 
as  abstractions  and  metaphysical  theories,  good 
enough  for  the  cloister,  but  too  refined  for  practical 
and  real  life. 

Human  rights,  however,  are  not  to  be  so 
reasoned  away.  They  belong,  as  we  have  seen, 
to  man  as  a  moral  being,  and  nothing  can  divest 
him  of  them  but  the  destruction  of  his  nature. 
They  are  not  to  be  given  up  to  society  as  a  prey. 
On  the  contrary,  the  great  end  of  civil  society  is  to 
secure  them.  The  great  end  of  government  is  to 
repress  all  wrong.  Its  highest  function  is  to  pro 
tect  the  weak  against  the  powerful,  so  that  the 
obscurest  human  being  may  enjoy  his  rights  in 
peace.  Strange  that  an  institution,  built  on  the 
idea  of  Rights,  should  be  used  to  unsettle  this 
idea,  to  confuse  our  moral  perceptions,  to  sanctify 
wrongs  as  means  of  general  good. 


37 

It  is  said  that  in  forming  civil  society  the  indi 
vidual  surrenders  a  part  of  his  rights.  It  would 
be  more  proper  to  say  that  he  adopts  new  modes 
of  securing  them.  He  consents,  for  example,  to 
desist  from  self-defence,  that  he  and  all  may  be 
more  effectually  defended  by  the  public  force. 
He  consents  to  submit  his  cause  to  an  umpire  or 
tribunal,  that  justice  may  be  more  impartially 
awarded,  and  that  he  and  all  may  more  certainly 
receive  their  due.  He  consents  to  part  with  a 
portion  of  his  property  in  taxation,  that  his  own 
and  others'  property  may  be  the  more  secure. 
He  submits  to  certain  restraints,  that  he  and 
others  may  enjoy  more  enduring  freedom.  He 
expects  an  equivalent  for  what  he  relinquishes, 
and  insists  on  it  as  his  right.  He  is  wronged  by 
partial  laws,  which  compel  him  to  contribute  to 
the  state  beyond  his  proportion,  his  ability,  and 
the  measure  of  benefits  which  he  receives.  How 
absurd  is  it  to  suppose,  that  by  consenting  to  be 
protected  by  the  state,  and  by  yielding  it  the 
means,  he  surrenders  the  very  rights  which  were 
the  objects  of  his  accession  to  the  social  compact ! 

The  authority  of  the  state  to  impose  laws  on  its 
members  I  cheerfully  allow  ;  but  this  has  limits, 
which  are  found  to  be  more  and  more  narrow  in 
proportion  to  the  progress  of  moral  science.  The 
state  is  equally  restrained  with  individuals  by  the 
moral  law.  For  example,  it  may  not,  must  not 


38 


on  any  account,  put  an  innocent  man  to  death,  or 
require  of  him  a  dishonorable  or  criminal  service. 
It  rnay  demand  allegiance,  but  only  on  the  ground 
of  the  protection  it  affords.  It  may  levy  taxes, 
but  only  because  it  takes  all  property  and  all 
interests  under  its  shield.  It  may  pass  laws,  but 
only  impartial  ones,  framed  for  the  whole  and 
not  for  the  few.  It  must  not  seize  by  a  special 
act  the  property  of  the  humblest  individual,  with 
out  making  him  an  equivalent.  It  must  regard 
every  man,  over  whom  it  extends  its  authority,  as 
a  vital  part  of  itself,  as  entitled  to  its  care  and  to 
its  provisions  for  liberty  and  happiness.  If,  in  an 
emergency,  its  safety,  which  is  the  interest  of 
each  and  all,  may  demand  the  imposition  of 
peculiar  restraints  on  one  or  many,  it  is  bound  to 
limit  these  restrictions  to  the  precise  point  which 
its  safety  prescribes,  to  remove  the  necessity  of 
them  as  far  and  as  fast  as  possible,  to  compensate 
by  peculiar  protection  such  as  it  deprives  of  the 
ordinary  means  of  protecting  themselves,  and,  in 
general,  to  respect  and  provide  for  liberty  in  the 
very  acts  which  for  a  time  restrain  it.  The  idea 
of  Rights,  I  repeat  it,  should  be  fundamental  and 
supreme  in  civil  institutions.  Government  be 
comes  a  nuisance  and  scourge,  in  proportion  as  it 
sacrifices  these  to  the  many  or  the  few.  Govern 
ment,  I  repeat  it,  is  equally  bound  with  the  indi 
vidual  by  the  moral  law.  The  ideas  of  Justice 


39 

and  Rectitude,  of  what  is  due  to  man  from  his 
fellow-creatures,  of  the  claims  of  every  moral 
being,  are  far  deeper  and  more  primitive  than 
Civil  Polity.  Government,  far  from  originating 
them,  owes  to  them  its  strength.  Right  is  older 
than  human  law.  Law  ought  to  be  its  voice.  It 
should  be  built  on  and  should  correspond  to  the 
principle  of  justice  in  the  human  breast,  and  its 
weakness  is  owing  to  nothing  more  than  to  its 
clashing  with  our  indestructible  moral  convictions. 
That  government  is  most  perfect,  in  which 
Policy  is  most  entirely  subjected  to  Justice,  or  in 
which  the  supreme  and  constant  aim  is  to  secure 
the  rights  of  every  human  being.  This  is  the 
beautiful  idea  of  a  free  government,  and  no  gov 
ernment  is  free  but  in  proportion  as  it  realizes 
this.  Liberty  must  not  be  confounded  with  pop 
ular  institutions.  A  representative  government 
may  be  as  despotic  as  an  absolute  monarchy.  In 
as  far  as  it  tramples  on  the  rights,  whether  of  many 
or  one,  it  is  a  despotism.  The  sovereign  power, 
whether  wielded  by  a  single  hand  or  several  hands, 
by  a  king  or  a  congress,  which  spoils  one  human 
being  of  the  immunities  and  privileges  bestowed 
on  him  by  God,  is  so  far  a  tyranny.  The  great 
argument  in  favor  of  representative  institutions  is, 
that  a  people's  rights  are  safest  in  their  own 
hands,  and  should  never  be  surrendered  to  an 
irresponsible  power.  Rights,  Rights,  lie  at  the 


40 

foundation  of  a  popular  government;  and  when 
this  betrays  them,  the  wrong  is  more  aggravated 
than  when  they  are  crushed  by  depotism. 

Still  the  question  will  be  asked,  "  Is  not  the 
General  Good  the  supreme  law  of  the  state? 
Are  not  all  restraints  on  the  individual  just, 
which  this  demands?  When  the  rights  of  the 

O 

individual  clash  with  this,  must  they  not  yield  ? 
Do  they  not,  indeed,  cease  to  be  rights  ?  Must 
not  every  thing  give  place  to  the  General  Good  ?  " 
I  have  started  this  question  in  various  forms, 
because  I  deem  it  worthy  of  particular  examina 
tion.  Public  and  private  morality,  the  freedom 
and  safety  of  our  national  institutions,  are  greatly 
concerned  in  settling  the  claims  of  the  "  General 
Good."  In  monarchies,  the  Divine  Right  of 
kings  swallowed  up  all  others.  In  republics  the 
General  Good  threatens  the  same  evil.  It  is  a 
shelter  for  the  abuses  and  usurpations  of  govern 
ment,  for  the  profligacies  of  statesmen,  for  the 
vices  of  parties,  for  the  wrongs  of  slavery.  In 
considering  this  subject,  I  take  the  hazard  of  re 
peating  principles  already  laid  down ;  but  this  will 
be  justified  by  the  importance  of  reaching  and 
determining  the  truth.  Is  the  General  Good,  then, 
the  supreme  law  to  which  every  thing  must  bow  ? 
This  question  may  be  settled  at  once  by  pro 
posing  another.  Suppose  the  Public  Good  to 
require  that  a  number  of  the  members  of  a  state, 


41 

no  matter  how  few,  should  perjure  themselves,  or 
should  disclaim  their  faith  in  God  and  virtue. 
Would  their  right  to  follow  conscience  and  God 
be  annulled  ?  Would  they  be  bound  to  sin  ? 
Suppose  a  conqueror  to  menace  a  state  with  ruin, 
unless  its  members  should  insult  their  parents,  and 
stain  themselves  with  crimes  at  which  nature 
revolts  ?  Must  the  Public  Good  prevail  over 
purity  and  our  holiest  affections  ?  Do  we  not  all 
feel,  that  there  are  higher  goods  than  even  the 
safety  of  the  state  ?  That  there  is  a  higher  law 
than  that  of  mightiest  empires  ?  That  the  idea 
of  Rectitude  is  deeper  in  human  nature  than 
that  of  private  or  public  interest  ?  And  that  this 
is  to  bear  sway  over  all  private  and  public  acts  ? 

The  supreme  law  of  a  state  is  not  its  safety, 
its  power,  its  prosperity,  its  affluence,  the  flourish 
ing  state  of  agriculture,  commerce,  and  the  arts. 
These  objects,  constituting  what  is  commonly 
called  the  Public  Good,  are,  indeed,  proposed,  and 
ought  to  be  proposed,  in  the  constitution  and  ad 
ministration  of  states.  But  there  is  a  higher  law, 
even  Virtue,  Rectitude,  the  Voice  of  Conscience, 
the  Will  of  God.  Justice  is  a  greater  good  than 
property,  not  greater  in  degree,  but  in  kind. 
Universal  benevolence  is  infinitely  superior  to 
prosperity.  Religion,  the  love  of  God,  is  worth 
incomparably  more  than  all  his  outward  gifts.  A 
community,  to  secure  or  aggrandize  itself,  must 
never  forsake  the  Right,  the  Holy,  the  Just. 


42 

Moral  Good,  Rectitude  in  all  its  branches,  is 
the  Supreme  Good  ;  by  which  I  do  not  intend  that 
it  is  the  surest  means  to  the  security  and  prosper 
ity  of  the  state.  Such,  indeed,  it  is,  but  this  is  too 
low  a  view.  It  must  not  be  looked  upon  as  a 
Means,  an  Instrument.  It  is  the  Supreme  End, 
and  states  are  bound  to  subject  to  it  all  their  legis 
lation,  be  the  apparent  loss  of  prosperity  ever 
so  great.  National  wealth  is  not  the  End.  It 
derives  all  its  worth  from  national  virtue.  If 
accumulated  by  rapacity,  conquest,  or  any  de 
grading  means,  or  if  concentrated  in  the  hands  of 
the  few,  whom  it  strengthens  to  crush  the  many, 
it  is  a  curse.  National  wealth  is  a  blessing,  only 
when  it  springs  from  and  represents  the  intelli 
gence  and  virtue  of  the  community,  when  it  is  a 
fruit  and  expression  of  good  habits,  of  respect  for 
the  rights  of  all,  of  impartial  and  beneficent  legis 
lation,  when  it  gives  impulse  to  the  higher  facul 
ties,  and  occasion  and  incitement  to  justice  and 
beneficence.  No  greater  calamity  can  befall  a 
people  than  to  prosper  by  crime.  No  success  can 
be  a  compensation  for  the  wound  inflicted  on  a 
nation's  mind  by  renouncing  Right  as  its  Supreme 
Law. 

Let  a  people  exalt  Prosperity  above  Recti 
tude,  and  a  more  dangerous  end  cannot  be  pro 
posed.  Public  Prosperity,  General  Good,  regarded 
by  itself,  or  apart  from  the  moral  law,  is  something 


43 

vague,  unsettled,  and  uncertain,  and  will  infallibly 
be  so  construed  by  the  selfish  and  grasping  as  to 
secure  their  own  aggrandizement.  It  may  be  made 
to  wear  a  thousand  forms  according  to  men's  inter 
ests  and  passions.  This  is  illustrated  by  every 
day's  history.  Not  a  party  springs  up,  which  does 
not  sanctify  all  its  projects  for  monopolizing  power 
by  the  plea  of  General  Good.  Not  a  measure, 
however  ruinous,  can  be  proposed,  which  cannot 
be  shown  to  favor  one  or  another  national  interest. 
The  truth  is,  that,  in  the  uncertainty  of  human 
affairs,  an  uncertainty  growing  out  of  the  infinite 
and  very  subtile  causes  which  are  acting  on  commu 
nities,  the  consequences  of  no  measure  can  be 
foretold  with  certainty.  The  best  concerted 
schemes  of  policy  often  fail ;  whilst  a  rash  and 
profligate  administration  may,  by  unexpected  con 
currences  of  events,  seem  to  advance  a  nation's 
glory.  In  regard  to  the  means  of  national  pros 
perity  the  wisest  are  weak  judges.  For  example, 
the  present  rapid  growth  of  this  country,  carrying, 
as  it  does,  vast  multitudes  beyond  the  institutions 
of  religion  and  education,  may  be  working  ruin, 
whilst  the  people  exult  in  it  as  a  pledge  of  great 
ness.  We  are  too  short-sighted  to  find  our  law  in 
outward  interests.  To  stales,  as  to  individuals, 
Rectitude  is  the  Supreme  Law.  It  was  never 
designed  that  the  Public  Good,  as  disjoined  from 
this,  as  distinct  from  justice  and  reverence  for  all 


44 

rights,  should  be  comprehended  and  made  our 
end.  Statesmen  work  in  the  dark,  until  the  idea 
of  Right  towers  above  expediency  or  wealth.  Wo 
to  that  people  which  would  found  its  prosperity  in 
wrong !  It  is  time  that  the  low  maxims  of  policy, 
which  have  ruled  for  ages,  should  fall.  It  is  time 
that  Public  Interest  should  no  longer  hallow  injus 
tice,  and  fortify  government  in  making  the  weak 
their  prey. 

In  this  discussion,  I  have  used  the  phrase,  Public 
or  General  Good,  in  its  common  acceptation,  as 
signifyingthe  safety  and  prosperity  of  a  state.  Why 
can  it  not  be  used  in  a  larger  sense  ?  Why  can  it 
not  be  made  to  comprehend  inward  and  moral,  as 
well  as  outward  good  ?  And  why  cannot  the  former 
be  understood  to  be  incomparably  the  most  impor 
tant  element  of  the  public  weal  ?  Then,  indeed,  I 
should  assent  to  the  proposition,  that  the  General 
Good  is  the  supreme  law.  So  construed,  it  would 
support  the  great  truths  which  I  have  maintained. 
It  would  condemn  the  infliction  of  wrong  on  the 
humblest  individual,  as  a  national  calamity.  It 
would  plead  with  us  to  extend  to  every  individual 
the  means  of  improving  his  character  and  lot. 

If  the  remarks  under  this  head  be  just,  it  will 
follow  that  the  good  of  the  Individual  is  more  im 
portant  than  the  outward  prosperity  of  the  State. 
The  former  is  not  vague  and  unsettled,  like  the 
latter,  and  it  belongs  to  a  higher  order  of  interests. 


45 


It  consists  of  the  free  exertion  and  expansion  of 
the  individual's  powers,  especially  of  his  higher 
faculties  ;  in  the  energy  of  his  intellect,  conscience, 
and  good  affections ;  in  sound  judgment ;  in  the 
acquisition  of  truth  ;  in  laboring  honestly  for  himself 
and  his  family;  in  loving  his  Creator,  and  subject 
ing  his  own  will  to  the  Divine  ;  in  loving  his  fellow- 
creatures,  and  making  cheerful  sacrifices  to  their 
happiness  ;  in  friendship  ;  in  sensibility  to  the  beau 
tiful,  whether  in  nature  or  art ;  in  loyalty  to  his 
principles;  in  moral  courage;  in  self-respect;  in 
understanding  and  asserting  his  rights ;  and  in  the 
Christian  hope  of  immortality.  Such  is  the  good 
of  the  Individual ;  a  more  sacred,  exalted,  enduring 
interest,  than  any  accessions  of  wealth  or  power  to 
the  State.  Let  it  not  be  sacrificed  to  these.  He 
should  find,  in  his  connexions  with  the  community, 
aids  to  the  accomplishment  of  these  purposes  of  his 
being,  and  not  be  chained  and  subdued  by  it  to 
the  inferior  interests  of  any  fellow-creature. 

In  all  ages  the  Individual  has  in  one  form  or 
another  been  trodden  in  the  dust.  In  monarchies 
and  aristocracies  he  has  been  sacrificed  to  One  or 
to  the  Few  ;  who,  regarding  government  as  an  heir 
loom  in  their  families,  and  thinking  of  the  people 
as  made  only  to  live  and  die  for  their  glory,  have 
not  dreamed  that  the  sovereign  power  was  de 
signed  to  shield  every  man,  without  exception,  from 
wrong.  In  the  ancient  Republics,  the  Glory  of  the 


46 


State,  especially  Conquest,  was  the  end  to  which 
the  individual  was  expected  to  offer  himself  a  vic 
tim,  and  in  promoting  which  no  cruelty  was  to  be 
declined,  no  human  right  revered.  He  was  merged 
in  a  great  whole,  called  the  Commonwealth,  to 
which  his  whole  nature  was  to  be  immolated.  It 
was  the  glory  of  the  American  people,  that  in  their 
Declaration  of  Independence  they  took  the  ground 
of  the  indestructible  rights  of  every  human  being. 
They  declared  all  men  to  be  essentially  equal, 
and  each  born  to  be  free.  They  did  not,  like  the 
Greek  or  Roman,  assert  for  themselves  a  liberty, 
which  they  burned  to  wrest  from  other  states. 
They  spoke  in  the  name  of  humanity,  as  the  repre 
sentatives  of  the  rights  of  the  feeblest,  as  well  as 
mightiest,  of  their  race.  They  published  universal, 
everlasting  principles,  which  are  to  work  out  the 
deliverance  of  every  human  being.  Such  was 
their  glory.  Let  not  the  idea  of  Rights  be  erased 
from  their  children's  minds  by  false  ideas  of  public 
good.  Let  not  the  sacredness  of  individual  man 
be  forgotten  in  the  feverish  pursuit  of  property.  It 
is  more  important  that  the  Individual  should  respect 
himself,  and  be  respected  by  others,  than  that  the 
wealth  of  both  worlds  should  be  accumulated  on 
our  shores.  National  wealth  is  not  the  end  of 
society.  It  may  exist  where  large  classes  are 
depressed  and  wronged.  It  may  undermine  a 
nation's  spirit,  institutions,  and  independence.  It 


47 

/ 

can  have  no  value  and  no  sure  foundation,  until  the 
Supremacy  of  the  Rights  of  the  Individual  is  the 
first  article  of  a  nation's  faith,  and  until  reverence 
for  them  becomes  the  spirit  of  public  men. 

Perhaps  it  will  be  replied  to  all  which  has  now 
been  said,  that  there  is  an  argument  from  experi 
ence,  which  invalidates  the  doctrines  of  this  section. 
It  may  be  said,  that  human  rights,  notwithstanding 
what  has  been  said  of  their  sacredness,  do  and 
must  yield  to  the  exigencies  of  real  life,  that 
there  is  often  a  stern  necessity  in  human  affairs  to 
which  they  bow.  I  may  be  asked,  whether,  in  the 
history  of  nations,  circumstances  do  not  occur,  in 
which  the  rigor  of  the  principles,  now  laid  down,  must 
be  relaxed  ?  Whether,  in  seasons  of  imminent  peril 
to  the  state,  private  rights  must  not  give  way  ?  I 
may  be  asked,  whether  the  establishment  of  mar 
tial  law  and  a  dictator  has  not  sometimes  been 
justified  and  demanded  by  public  danger,  and 
whether,  of  course,  the  rights  and  liberties  of  the 
individual  are  not  held  at  the  discretion  of  the 
state.  I  admit,  in  reply,  that  extreme  cases  may 
occur,  in  which  the  exercise  of  rights  and  freedom 
may  be  suspended ;  but  suspended  only  for  their 
ultimate  and  permanent  security.  At  such  times, 
when  the  frantic  fury  of  the  many,  or  the  usurpa 
tions  of  the  few  interrupt  the  administration  of  law, 
and  menace  property  and  life,  society,  threatened 
with  ruin,  puts  forth  instinctively  spasmodic  efforts 


48 

for  its  own  preservation.  It  flies  to  an  irresponsi 
ble  dictator  for  its  protection.  But  in  these 
cases,  the  great  idea  of  Rights  predominates  amidst 
their  apparent  subversion.  A  power  above  all 
laws  is  conferred,  only  that  the  empire  of  law  may 
be  restored.  Despotic  restraints  are  imposed  only 
that  liberty  may  be  rescued  from  ruin.  All  rights 
are  involved  in  the  safety  of  the  state  ;  and  hence,  in 
the  cases  referred  to,  the  safety  of  the  state  becomes 
the  supreme  law.  The  individual  is  bound  for  a 
time  to  forego  his  freedom  for  the  salvation  of 
institutions,  without  which  liberty  is  but  a  name. 
To  argue  from  such  sacrifices  that  he  may  be  per 
manently  made  a  slave,  is  as  great  an  insult  to 
reason  as  to  humanity.  It  maybe  added,  that  sacri 
fices,  which  may  be  demanded  for  the  safety,  are 
not  due  from  the  individual  to  the  prosperity  of 
the  state.  The  great  end  of  civil  society  is  to 
secure  rights,  not  accumulate  wealth  ;  and  to  merge 
the  former  in  the  latter  is  to  turn  political  union 
into  degradation  and  a  scourge,  The  community  is 
bound  to  take  the  rights  of  each  and  all  under  its 
guardianship.  It  must  substantiate  its  claim  to 
universal  obedience  by  redeeming  its  pledge  of 
universal  protection.  It  must  immolate  no  man  to 
the  prosperity  of  the  rest.  Its  laws  should  be 
made  for  all,  its  tribunals  opened  to  all.  It  cannot 
without  guilt  abandon  any  of  its  members  to  pri 
vate  oppression,  to  irresponsible  power. 


49 


We  have  thus  established  the  reality  and  sa- 
credness  of  human  rights  ;  and  that  slavery  is  an 
infraction  of  these  is  too  plain  to  need  any  labored 
proof.  Slavery  violates  not  one,  but  all  ;  and  vio 
lates  them  not  incidentally,  but  necessarily,  syste 
matically,  from  its  very  nature.  In  starting  with 
the  assumption  that  the  slave  is  property,  it 
sweeps  away  every  defence  of  human  rights  and 
lays  them  in  the  dust.  Were  it  necessary  I  might 
enumerate  them,  and  show  how  all  fall  before 
this  terrible  usurpation ;  but  a  few  remarks  will 
suffice. 

Slavery  strips  man  of  the  fundamental  right  to 
inquire  into,  consult,  and  seek  his  own  happiness. 
His  powers  belong  to  another,  and  for  another  they 
must  be  used.  He  must  form  no  plans,  engage 
in  no  enterprises,  for  bettering  his  condition. 
Whatever  be  his  capacities,  however  equal  to 
great  improvements  of  his  lot,  he  is  chained  for  life 
by  another's  will  to  the  same  unvaried  toil.  He 
is  forbidden  to  do  for  himself  or  others  the  work, 
for  which  God  stamped  him  with  his  own  image, 
and  endowed  him  with  his  own  best  gifts.  — 
Again,  the  slave  is  stripped  of  the  right  to  acquire 
property.  Being  himself  owned,  his  earnings 
belong  to  another.  He  can  possess  nothing  but 
by  favor.  That  right  on  which  the  development 
of  men's  powers  so  much  depends,  the  right  to 
make  accumulations,  to  gain  exclusive  possessions 
4 


50 

by  honest  industry,  is  withheld.  "The  slave  can 
acquire  nothing,"  says  one  of  the  slave-codes, 
"  but  what  must  belong  to  his  master;"  and  how 
ever  this  definition,  which  moves  the  indignation 
of  the  free,  may  be  mitigated  by  favor,  the  spirit 
of  it  enters  into  the  very  essence  of  slavery. — 
Again,  the  slave  is  stripped  of  his  right  to  his  wife 
and  children.  They  belong  to  another,  and  may 
be  torn  from  him,  one  and  all,  at  any  moment,  at 
his  master's  pleasure.  —  Again,  the  slave  is  stripped 
of  the  right  to  the  culture  of  his  rational  powers. 
He  is  in  some  cases  deprived  by  law  of  instruction, 
which  is  placed  within  his  reach  by  the  improve 
ments  of  society  and  the  philanthropy  of  the  age. 
He  is  not  allowed  to  toil,  that  his  children  may 
enjoy  a  better  education  than  himself.  The  most 
sacred  right  of  human  nature,  that  of  developing 
his  best  faculties,  is  denied.  Even  should  it  be 
granted,  it  would  be  conceded  as  a  favor,  and 
might  at  any  moment  be  withheld  by  the  capri 
cious  will  of  another.  —  Again,  the  slave  is  de 
prived  of  the  right  of  self-defence.  No  injury 
from  a  white  man  is  he  suffered  to  repel,  nor  can 
he  seek  redress  from  the  laws  of  his  country.  If 
accumulated  insult  and  wrong  provoke  him  to  the 
slightest  retaliation,  this  effort  for  self-protection,  al 
lowed  and  commended  toothers,  is  a  crime  for  which 
he  must  pay  a  fearful  penalty.  —  Again,  the  slave 
is  stripped  of  the  right  to  be  exempted  from  all 


51 

harm  except  for  wrong  doing.  He  is  subjected  to 
the  lash,  by  those  whom  he  has  never  consented 
to  serve,  and  whose  claim  to  him  as  property  we 
have  seen  to  be  a  usurpation ;  and  this  power  of 
punishment,  which,  if  justly  claimed,  should  be  ex 
ercised  with  a  fearful  care,  is  often  delegated  to 
men  in  whose  hands  there  is  a  moral  certainty 
of  its  abuse. 

I  will  add  but  one  more  example  of  the  viola 
tion  of  human  rights  by  slavery.  The  slave  vir 
tually  suffers  the  wrong  of  robbery,  though  with 
utter  unconsciousness  on  the  part  of  those  who 
inflict  it.  It  may,  indeed,  be  generally  thought, 
that,  as  he  is  suffered  to  own  nothing,  he  cannot 
fall,  at  least,  under  this  kind  of  violence.  But  it  is 
not  true  that  he  owns  nothing.  Whatever  he 
may  be  denied  by  man,  he  holds  from  nature 
the  most  valuable  property,  and  that  from  which 
all  other  is  derived,  I  mean  his  strength.  His 
labor  is  his  own,  by  the  gift  of  that  God  who 
nerved  his  arm,  and  gave  him  intelligence  and 
conscience  to  direct  the  use  of  it  for  his  own 
and  others'  happiness.  No  possession  is  so  pre 
cious  as  a  man's  force  of  body  and  mind.  The 
exertion  of  this  in  labor  is  the  great  foundation 
and  source  of  property  in  outward  things.  The 
worth  of  articles  of  traffic  is  measured  by  the 
labor  expended  in  their  production.  To  the 
great  mass  of  men,  in  all  countries,  their  strength 


52 

or  labor  is  their  whole  fortune.  To  seize  on  this 
would  be  to  rob  them  of  their  all.  In  truth,  no 
robbery  is  so  great  as  that  to  which  the  slave  is 
habitually  subjected.  To  take  by  force  a  man's 
whole  estate,  the  fruit  of  years  of  toil,  would  by 
universal  consent  be  denounced  as  a  great  wrong ; 
but  what  is  this,  compared  with  seizing  the  man 
himself,  and  appropriating  to  our  use  the  limbs, 
faculties,  strength,  and  labor,  by  which  all  prop 
erty  is  won  and  held  fast  ?  The  right  of  property 
in  outward  things  is  as  nothing,  compared  with  our 
right  to  ourselves.  Were  the  slave-holder  stript 
of  his  fortune,  he  would  count  the  violence  slight, 
compared  with  what  he  would  suffer,  were  his 
person  seized  and  devoted  as  a  chattel  to  another's 
use.  Let  it  not  be  said  that  the  slave  receives 
an  equivalent,  that  he  is  fed  and  clothed,  and  is 
not.  therefore,  robbed.  Suppose  another  to  wrest 
from  us  a  valued  possession,  and  to  pay  us  his 
own  price.  Should  we  not  think  ourselves  rob 
bed  ?  Would  not  the  laws  pronounce  the  invader 
a  robber  ?  Is  it  consistent  with  the  right  of 
property,  that  a  man  should  determine  the  equiv 
alent  for  what  he  takes  from  his  neighbour  ?  Espe 
cially  is  it  to  be  hoped,  that  the  equivalent  due  to 
the  laborer  will  be  scrupulously  weighed,  when 
he  himself  is  held  as  property,  and  all  his  earnings 
are  declared  to  be  his  master's  ?  So  great  an  in 
fraction  of  human  right  is  slavery  ! 


53 

In  reply  to  these  remarks,  it  may  be  said  that 
the  theory  and  practice  of  slavery  differ ;  that  the 
rights  of  the  slave  are  not  as  wantonly  sported 
with  as  the  claims  of  the  master  might  lead  us  to 
infer ;  that  some  of  his  possessions  are  sacred  ;  that 
not  a  few  slave-holders  refuse  to  divorce  husband 
and  wife,  to  sever  parent  and  child ;  and  that  in 
many  cases  the  power  of  punishment  is  used  so 
reluctantly,  as  to  encourage  insolence  and  insubor 
dination.  All  this  I  have  no  disposition  to  deny. 
Indeed  it  must  be  so.  It  is  not  in  human  nature 
to  wink  .wholly  out  of  sight  the  rights  of  a  fellow- 
creature.  Degrade  him  as  we  may,  we  cannot 
altogether  forget  his  claims.  In  every  slave- 
country,  there  are,  undoubtedly,  masters  who  desire 
and  purpose  to  respect  these,  to  the  full  extent 
which  the  nature  of  the  relation  will  allow.  Still, 
human  rights  are  denied.  They  lie  wholly  at 
another's  mercy  ;  and  we  must  have  studied  history 
in  vain,  if  we  need  be  told  that  they  will  be  con 
tinually  the  prey  of  this  absolute  power.  —  The 
Evils  involved  in  and  flowing  from  the  denial 
and  infraction  of  the  rights  of  the  slave  will  form 
the  subject  of  a  subsequent  chapter. 


CHAPTER    III. 


EXPLANATIONS. 

I  HAVE  endeavoured  to  show  in  the  preceding 
sections  that  slavery  is  a  violation  of  sacred  rights, 
the  infliction  of  a  great  wrong.  And  here  a  ques 
tion  arises.  It  may  be  asked,  whether,  by  this 
language,  I  intend  to  fasten  on  the  slave-holder 
the  charge  of  peculiar  guilt.  On  this  point  great 
explicitness  is  a  duty.  Sympathy  with  the  slave 
has  often  degenerated  into  injustice  towards  the 
master.  I  wish  it,  then,  to  be  understood,  that, 
in  ranking  slavery  among  the  greatest  wrongs,  I 
speak  of  the  injury  endured  by  the  slave,  and  not 
of  the  character  of  the  master.  These  are  distinct 
points.  The  former  does  not  determine  the  latter. 
The  wrong  is  the  same  to  the  slave,  from  what 
ever  motive  or  spirit  it  may  be  inflicted.  But 
this  motive  or  spirit  determines  wholly  the  charac 
ter  of  him  who  inflicts  it.  Because  a  great  injury 
is  done  to  another,  it  does  not  follow  that  he  who 
does  it  is  a  depraved  man  ;  for  he  may  do  it  uncon 
sciously,  and,  still  more,  may  do  it  in  the  belief  that 


55 


he  confers  a  good.  We  have  learned  little  of 
moral  science  and  of  human  nature,  if  we  do  not 
know  that  guilt  is  to  he  measured,  not  by  the  out 
ward  act,  but  by  unfaithfulness  to  conscience  ;  and 
that  the  consciences  of  men  are  often  darkened 
by  education,  and  other  inauspicious  influences. 
All  men  have  partial  consciences,  or  want  com 
prehension  of  some  duties.  All  partake,  in  a 
measure,  of  the  errors  of  the  community  in  which 
they  live.  Some  are  betrayed  into  moral  mistakes 
by  the  very  force  with  which  conscience  acts  in 
regard  to  some  particular  duty.  As  the  intellect, 
in  grasping  one  truth,  often  loses  its  hold  of  others, 
and  by  giving  itself  up  to  one  idea,  falls  into  ex 
aggeration  ;  so  the  moral  sense,  in  seizing  on  a  partic 
ular  exercise  of  philanthropy,  forgets  other  duties, 
and  will  even  violate  many  important  precepts  in 
its  passionate  eagerness  to  carry  one  to  perfection. 
Innumerable  illustrations  may  be  given  of  the 
liableness  of  men  to  moral  error.  The  practice, 
which  strikes  one  man  with  horror,  may  seem  to 
another,  who  was  born  and  brought  up  in  the 
midst  of  it,  not  only  innocent,  but  meritorious. 
We  must  judge  others,  not  by  our  light,  but  by 
their  own.  We  must  take  their  place,  and  con 
sider  what  allowance  we  in  their  position  might 
justly  expect.  Our  ancestors  at  the  North  were 
concerned  in  the  slave-trade.  Some  of  us  can 
recollect  individuals  of  the  colored  race,  who  were 


56 

torn  from  Africa,  and  grew  old  under  our  parental 
roofs.  Our  ancestors  committed  a  deed  now 
branded  as  piracy.  Were  they,  therefore,  the 
offscouring  of  the  earth  ?  Were  not  some  of 
them  among  the  best  of  their  times?  The  ad 
ministration  of  religion  in  almost  all  past  ages  has 
been  a  violation  of  the  sacred  rights  of  conscience. 
How  many  sects  have  persecuted  and  shed  blood ! 
Were  their  members,  therefore,  monsters  of  de 
pravity  ?  The  history  of  our  race  is  made  up  of 
wrongs,  many  of  which  were  committed  without  a 
suspicion  of  their  true  character,  and  many  from 
an  urgent  sense  of  duty.  A  man  born  among 
slaves,  accustomed  to  this  relation  from  his  birth, 
taught  its  necessity  by  venerated  parents,  associa 
ting  it  with  all  whom  he  reveres,  and  too  familiar 
with  its  evils  to  see  and  feel  their  magnitude,  can 
hardly  be  expected  to  look  on  slavery  as  it  appears 
to  more  impartial  and  distant  observers  ?  Let  it 
not  be  said  that  when  new  light  is  offered  him  he 
is  criminal  in  rejecting  it.  Are  we  all  willing  to 
receive  new  light  ?  Can  we  wonder  that  such 
a  man  should  be  slow  to  be  convinced  of  the 
criminality  of  an  abuse  sanctioned  by  prescription, 
and  which  has  so  interwoven  itself  with  all  the 
habits,  employments,  and  economy  of  life,  that 
he  can  hardly  conceive  of  the  existence  of  society 
without  this  all-pervading  element  ?  May  he  not 
be  true  to  his  convictions  of  duty  in  other  relations, 


57 

though  he  grievously  err  in  this?  If,  indeed, 
through  cupidity  and  selfishness,  he  stifle  the 
monitions  of  conscience,  warp  his  judgment,  and 
repel  the  light,  he  incurs  great  guilt.  If  he  want 
virtue  to  resolve  on  doing  right,  though  at  the  loss 
of  every  slave,  he  incurs  great  guilt.  But  who  of 
us  can  look  into  his  heart  ?  To  whom  are  the 
secret  workings  there  revealed  ? 

Still  more.  There  are  masters  who  have  thrown 
off  the  natural  prejudices  of  their  position,  who  see 
slavery  as  it  is,  and  who  hold  the  slave  chiefly,  if 
not  wholly,  from  disinterested  considerations ;  and 
these  deserve  great  praise.  They  deplore  and 
abhor  the  institution  ;  but  believing  that  partial  eman 
cipation,  in  the  present  condition  of  society,  would 
bring  unmixed  evil  on  bond  and  free,  they  think 
themselves  bound  to  continue  the  relation,  until  it 
shall  be  dissolved  by  comprehensive  and  systematic 
measures  of  the  state.  There  are  many  of  them 
who  would  shudder  as  much  as  we  at  reducing  a 
freeman  to  bondage,  but  who  are  appalled  by  what 
seem  to  them  the  perils  and  difficulties  of  liberat 
ing  multitudes,  born  and  brought  up  to  that  condi 
tion.  Theje  are  many,  who,  nominally  holding 
the  slave  as  property,  still  hold  him  for  his  own 
good  and  for  the  public  order,  and  would  blush  to 
retain  him  on  other  grounds.  Are  such  men  to  be 
set  down  among  the  unprincipled  ?  Am  I  told  that 
by  these  remarks  I  extenuate  slavery  ?  I  reply, 


58 

slavery  is  still  a  heavy  yoke,  and  strips  man  of  his 
dearest  rights,  be  the  master's  character  what  it 
may.  Slavery  is  not  less  a  curse,  because  long 
use  may  have  blinded  most,  who  support  it,  to  its 
evils.  Its  influence  is  still  blighting,  though  con 
scientiously  upheld.  Absolute  monarchy  is  still  a 
scourge,  though  among  despots  there  have  been 
good  men.  It  is  possible  to  abhor  and  oppose  bad 
institutions,  and  yet  to  abstain  from  indiscriminate 
condemnation  of  those  who  cling  to  them,  and 
even  to  see  in  their  ranks  greater  virtue  than  in 
ourselves.  It  is  true,  and  ought  to  be  cheerfully 
acknowledged,  that  in  the  slave-holding  States 
may  be  found  some  of  the  greatest  names  of  our 
history,  and,  what  is  still  more  important,  bright 
examples  of  private  virtue  and  Christian  love. 

There  is,  however,  there  must  be,  in  slave- 
holding  communities  a  large  class  which  cannot 
be  too  severely  condemned.  There  are  many, 
we  fear,  very  many,  who  hold  their  fellow-crea 
tures  in  bondage,  from  selfish,  base  motives. 
They  hold  the  slave  for  gain,  whether  justly  or 
unjustly  they  neither  ask  nor  care.  They  cling 
to  him  as  property,  and  have  no  faith  in  the  prin 
ciples  which  will  diminish  a  man's  wealth.  They 
hold  him,  not  for  his  own  good  or  the  safety 'of  the 
state,  but  with  precisely  the  same  views  with 
which  they  hold  a  laboring  horse,  that  is,  for  the 
profit  which  they  can  wring  from  him.  They  will 


59 

not  hear  a  word  of  his  wrongs ;  for,  wronged  or  not, 
they  will  not  let  him  go.  He  is  their  property,  and 
they  mean  not  to  be  poor  for  righteousness'  sake. 
Such  a  class  there  undoubtedly  is  among  slave 
holders;  how  large  their  own  consciences  must 
determine.  We  are  sure  of  it ;  for  under  such  cir 
cumstances  human  nature  will  and  must  come  to 
this  mournful  result.  Now,  to  men  of  this  spirit, 
the  explanations  we  have  made  do  in  no  degree 
apply.  Such  men  ought  to  tremble  before  the 
rebukes  of  outraged  humanity  and  indignant  virtue. 
Slavery,  upheld  for  gain,  is  a  great  crime.  He, 
who  has  nothing  to  urge  against  emancipation,  but 
that  it  will  make  him  poorer,  is  bound  to  Im 
mediate  Emancipation.  He  has  no  excuse  for 
wresting  from  his  brethren  their  rights.  The  plea 
of  benefit  to  the  slave  and  the  state  avails  him 
nothing.  He  extorts,  by  the  lash,  that  labor 
to  which  he  has  no  claim,  through  a  base  selfish 
ness.  Every  morsel  of  food,  thus  forced  from  the 
injured,  ought  to  be  bitterer  than  gall.  His  gold  is 
cankered.  The  sweat  of  the  slave  taints  the  lux 
uries  for  which  it  streams.  Better  were  it  for  the 
selfish  wrong  doer  of  whom  I  speak,  to  live  as  the 
slave,  to  clothe  himself  in  the  slave's  raiment,  to 
eat  the  slave's  coarse  food,  to  till  his  fields  with 
his  own  hands,  than  to  pamper  himself  by  day, 
and  pillow  his  head  on  down  at  night,  at  the  cost 
of  a  wantonly  injured  fellow-creature.  No  fellow- 


60 

creature  can  be  so  injured  without  taking  terrible 
vengeance.  He  is  terribly  avenged  even  now. 
The  blight  which  falls  on  the  soul  of  the  wrong 
doer,  the  desolation  of  his  moral  nature,  is  a  more 
terrible  calamity  than  he  inflicts.  In  deadening  his 
moral  feelings,  he  dies  to  the  proper  happiness  of  a 
man.  In  hardening  his  heart  against  his  fellow- 
creatures,  he  sears  it  to  all  true  joy.  In  shutting 
his  ear  against  the  voice  of  justice,  he  shuts  out  all 
the  harmonies  of  the  universe,  and  turns  the  voice 
of  God  within  him  into  rebuke.  He  may  prosper, 
indeed,  and  hold  faster  the  slave  by  whom  he 
prospers  ;  but  he  rivets  heavier  and  more  ignomini 
ous  chains  on  his  own  soul  than  he  lays  on  others. 
No  punishment  is  so  terrible  as  prosperous  guilt. 
No  fiend,  exhausting  on  us  all  his  power  of  torture, 
is  so  terrible  as  an  oppressed  fellow-creature.  The 
cry  of  the  oppressed,  unheard  on  earth,  is  heard  in 
heaven.  God  is  just,  and  if  justice  reign,  then  the 
unjust  must  terribly  suffer.  Then  no  being  can  profit 
by  evil  doing.  Then  all  the  laws  of  the  universe  are 
ordinances  against  guilt.  Then  every  enjoyment, 
gained  by  wrong  doing,  will  be  turned  into  a  curse. 
No  laws  of  nature  are  so  irrepealable  as  that  law 
which  binds  guilt  and  misery.  God  is  just.  Then 
all  the  defences,  which  the  oppressor  rears  against 
the  consequences  of  wrong  doing,  are  vain,  as  vain 
as  would  be  his  strivings  to  arrest  by  his  single 
arm  the  ocean  or  whirlwind.  He  may  disarm 


61 

the  slave.  Can  he  disarm  that  slave's  Creator? 
He  can  crush  the  spirit  of  insurrection  in  a  fellow- 
being.  Can  he  crush  the  awful  spirit  of  justice  and 
retribution  in  the  Almighty  ?  He  can  still  the 
murmur  of  discontent  in  his  victim.  Can  he  silence 
that  voice  which  speaks  in  thunder,  and  is  to  break 
the  sleep  of  the  grave  ?  Can  he  always  still  the 
reproving,  avenging  voice  in  his  own  breast  ? 

I  know  it  will  be  said,  "  You  would  make  us 
poor."  Be  poor,  then,  and  thank  God  for  your 
honest  poverty.  Better  be  poor  than  unjust. 
Better  beg  than  steal.  Better  live  in  an  alms- 
house,  better  die,  than  trample  on  a  fellow-creature 
and  reduce  him  to  a  brute,  for  selfish  gratification. 
What !  Have  we  yet  to  learn  that  "  it  profits 
us  nothing  to  gain  the  whole  world,  and  lose  our 
souls?" 

Let  it  not  be  replied,  in  scorn,  that  we  of  the 
North,  notorious  for  love  of  money,  and  given  to 
selfish  calculations,  are  not  the  people  to  call 
others  to  resign  their  wealth.  I  have  no  desire  to 
shield  the  North.  We  have,  without  doubt,  a 
great  multitude,  who,  were  they  slave-holders, 
would  sooner  die  than  relax  their  iron  grasp,  than 
yield  their  property  in  men  to  justice  and  the 
commands  of  God.  We  have  those  who  would 
fight  against  abolition,  if  by  this  measure  the  profit 
of  their  intercourse  with  the  South  should  be  ma 
terially  impaired.  The  present  excitement  among 


62 

us  is,  in  part,  the  working  of  mercenary  principles. 
But  because  the  North  joins  hands  with  the  South, 
shall  iniquity  go  unpunished  or  unrebuked  ?  Can 
the  league  of  the  wicked,  the  revolt  of  worlds, 
repeal  the  everlasting  law  of  heaven  and  earth  ? 
Has  God's  throne  fallen  before  Mammon's  ?  Must 
duty  find  no  voice,  no  organ,  because  corruption  is 
universally  diffused  ?  Is  not  this  a  fresh  motive  to 
solemn  warning,  that,  every  where,  Northward  and 
Southward,  the  rights  of  human  beings  are  held  so 
cheap,  in  comparison  with  worldly  gain? 


CHAPTE  R    IV. 


THE    EVILS    OF    SLAVERY. 

THE  subject  of  this  section  is  painful  and  re 
pulsive.  We  must  not,  however,  turn  away  from 
the  contemplation  of  human  sufferings  and  guilt. 
Evil  is  permitted  by  the  Creator,  that  we  should 
strive  against  it  in  faith,  and  hope,  and  charity. 
We  must  never  quail  before  it  because  of  its 
extent  and  duration,  never  feel  as  if  its  power 
were  greater  than  that  of  goodness.  It  is  meant 
to  call  forth  deep  sympathy  with  human  nature, 
and  unwearied  sacrifices  for  human  redemption. 
One  great  part  of  the  mission  of  every  man  on 
earth  is  to  contend  with  evil  in  some  of  its  forms ; 
and  there  are  some  evils  so  dependent  on  opinion, 
that  every  man,  in  judging  and  reproving  them 
faithfully,  does  something  towards  their  removal. 
Let  us  not,  then,  shrink  from  the  contemplation  of 
human  sufferings.  Even  sympathy,  if  we  have 
nothing  more  to  offer,  is  a  tribute  acceptable  to 
the  Universal  Father.  —  On  this  topic  exagge 
ration  should  be  conscientiously  shunned  ;  and,  at 


64 

the  same  time,  humanity  requires  that  the  whole 
truth  should  be  honestly  spoken. 

In  treating  of  the  evils  of  slavery,  I,  of  course, 
speak  of  its  general,  not  universal  effects,  of  its 
natural  tendencies,  not  unfailing  results.  There 
are  the  same  natural  differences  among  the  bond 
as  the  free,  and  there  is  a  great  diversity  in  the 
circumstances  in  which  they  are  placed.  The 
house-slave,  selected  for  ability  and  faithfulness, 
placed  amidst  the  habits,  accommodations,  and 
improvements  of  civilized  life,  admitted  to  a 
degree  of  confidence  and  familiarity,  and  requiting 
these  privileges  with  attachment,  is  almost  neces 
sarily  more  enlightened  and  respectable  than  the 
field-slave,  who  is  confined  to  monotonous  toils, 
and  to  the  society  and  influences  of  beings  as  de 
graded  as  himself.  The  mechanics  in  this  class 
are  sensibly  benefited  by  occupations  which  give 
a  higher  action  to  the  mind.  Among  the  bond, 
as  the  free,  will  be  found  those  to  whom  na 
ture  seems  partial,  and  who  are  carried  almost 
instinctively  towards  what  is  good.  I  speak  of 
the  natural,  general  influences  of  slavery.  Here, 
as  every  where  else,  there  are  exceptions  to 
the  rule,  and  exceptions  which  multiply  with  the 
moral  improvements  of  the  community  in  which 
the  slave  is  found.  But  these  do  not  determine 
the  general  character  of  the  institution.  It  has 
general  tendencies  founded  in  its  very  nature,  and 


65 


which  predominate  vastly  wherever  it  exists. 
These  tendencies  it  is  my  present  purpose  to 
unfold. 

1.  The  first  rank  among  the  evils  of  slavery 
must  be  given  to  its  Moral  influence.  This  is 
throughout  debasing.  Common  language  teaches 
this.  We  can  say  nothing  more  insulting  of 
another,  than  that  he  is  Slavish.  To  possess  the 
spirit  of  a  slave  is  to  have  sunk  to  the  lowest 
depths.  We  can  apply  to  slavery  no  worse 
name  than  its  own.  Men  have  always  shrunk 
instinctively  from  this  state,  as  the  most  de 
graded.  No  punishment,  save  death,  has  been 
more  dreaded,  and  to  avoid  it  death  has  often 
been  endured. 

In  expressing  the  moral  influence  of  slavery  the 
first  and  most  obvious  remark  is,  that  it  destroys 
the  proper  consciousness  and  spirit  of  a  Man.  The 
slave  regarded  and  treated  as  property,  bought  and 
sold  like  a  brute,  denied  the  rights  of  humanity,  un 
protected  against  insult,  made  a  tool,  and  systemati 
cally  subdued,  that  he  may  be  a  manageable,  useful 
tool,  how  can  he  help  regarding  himself  as  fallen 
below  his  race  ?  How  must  his  spirit  be  crushed  ! 
How  can  he  respect  himself?  He  becomes 
bound  to  Servility.  This  word,  borrowed  from 
his  condition,  expresses  the  ruin  wrought  by 
slavery  within  him.  The  idea,  that  he  was  made 
5 


66 

for  his  own  virtue  and  happiness,  scarcely  dawns 
on  his  mind.  To  be  an  instrument  of  the  physi 
cal,  material  good  of  another,  whose  will  is  his 
highest  law,  he  is  taught  to  regard  as  the  great 
purpose  of  his  being.  Here  lies  the  evil  of 
slavery.  Its  whips,  imprisonments,  and  even  the 
horrors  of  the  middle  passage  from  Africa  to 
America,  these  are  not  to  be  named,  in  compar 
ison  with  this  extinction  of  the  proper  conscious 
ness  of  a  human  being,  with  the  degradation  of  a 
man  into  a  brute. 

It  may  be  said,  that  the  slave  is  used  to  his 
yoke  ;  that  his  sensibilities  are  blunted  ;  that  he 
receives,  without  a  pang  or  a  thought,  the  treat 
ment  which  would  sting  other  men  to  madness. 
And  to  what  does  this  apology  amount  ?  It 
virtually  declares,  that  slavery  has  done  its  perfect 
work,  has  quenched  the  spirit  of  humanity,  that 
the  Man  is  dead  within  the  Slave.  Is  slavery, 
therefore,  no  wrong  ?  It  is  not,  however,  true, 
that  this  work  of  debasement  is  ever  so  effectually 
done  as  to  extinguish  all  feeling.  Man  is  too 
great  a  creature  to  be  wholly  ruined  by  man. 
When  he  seems  dead  he  only  sleeps.  There  are 
occasionally  some  sullen  murmurs  in  the  calm  of 
slavery,  showing  that  life  still  beats  in  the  soul, 
that  the  idea  of  Rights  cannot  be  wholly  effaced 
from  the  human  being 


67 

It  would  be  too  painful,  and  it  is  not  needed, 
to  detail  the  processes  by  which  the  spirit  is  broken 
in  slavery.  I  refer  to  one  only,  the  selling  of 
slaves.  The  practice  of  exposing  fellow-crea 
tures  for  sale,  of  having  markets  for  men  as  for 
cattle,  of  examining  the  limbs  and  muscles  of  a 
man  and  a  woman  as  of  a  brute,  of  putting  human 
beings  under  the  hammer  of  an  auctioneer,  and 
delivering  them,  like  any  other  articles  of  mer 
chandise,  to  the  highest  bidder,  all  this  is  such  an 
insult  to  our  common  nature,  and  so  infinitely 
degrading  to  the  poor  victim,  that  it  is  hard  to 
conceive  of  its  existence,  except  in  a  barbarous 
country. 

That  slavery  should  be  most  unpropitious  to  the 
slave  as  a  moral  being  will  be  farther  apparent,  if 
we  consider  that  his  condition  is  throughout  a 
Wrong,  and  that  consequently  it  must  tend  to 
unsettle  all  his  notions  of  duty.  The  violation 
of  his  own  rights,  to  which  he  is  inured  from 
birth,  must  throw  confusion  over  his  ideas  of  all 
human  rights.  He  cannot  comprehend  them  ; 
or,  if  he  does,  how  can  he  respect  them,  seeing 
them,  as  he  does,  perpetually  trampled  on  in  his 
own  person  ?  The  injury  to  the  character  from 
living  in  an  atmosphere  of  wrong,  we  can  all 
understand.  To  live  in  a  state  of  society,  of  whicli 
injustice  is  the  chief  arid  all-pervading  element, 
is  too  severe  a  trial  for  human  nature,  especially 


68 

when  no  means  are  used  to  counteract  its  in 
fluence. 

Accordingly  the  most  common  distinctions  of 
morality  are  faintly  apprehended  by  the  slave.  Re 
spect  for  property,  that  fundamental  law  of  civil 
society,  can  hardly  be  instilled  into  him.  His 
dishonesty  is  proverbial.  Theft  from  his  master 
passes  with  him  for  no  crime.  A  system  of  force 
is  generally  found  to  drive  to  fraud.  How  neces 
sarily  will  this  be  the  result  of  a  relation,  in  which 
force  is  used  to  extort  from  a  man  his  labor,  his 
natural  property,  without  an  attempt  to  win  his 
consent!  Can  we  wonder  that  the  uneducated 
conscience  of  the  man  who  is  daily  wronged 
should  allow  him  in  reprisals  to  the  extent  of  his 
power  ?  Thus  the  primary  social  virtue,  justice, 
is  undermined  in  the  slave. 

That  the  slave  should  yield  himself  to  intem 
perance,  licentiousness,  and,  in  general,  to  sensual 
excess,  we  must  'also  expect.  Doomed  to  live 
for  the  physical  indulgences  of  others,  unused  to 
any  pleasures  but  those  of  sense,  stripped  of 
self-respect,  and  having  nothing  to  gain  in  life, 
how  can  he  be  expected  to  govern  himself? 
How  naturally,  I  had  almost  said  necessarily,  does 
he  become  the  creature  of  sensation,  of  passion, 
of  the  present  moment !  What  aid  does  the  future 
give  him  in  withstanding  desire  ?  That  better  con 
dition,  for  which  other  men  postpone  the  cravings 


of  appetite,  never  opens  before  him.  The  sense 
of  character,  the  power  of  opinion,  another 
restraint  on  the  free,  can  do  little  or  nothing 
to  rescue  so  abject  a  class  from  excess  and  de 
basement.  In  truth,  power  over  himself  is  the 
last  virtue  we  should  expect  in  the  slave,  when 
we  think  of  him  as  subjected  to  absolute  power, 
and  made  to  move  passively  from  the  impulse 
of  a  foreign  will.  He  is  trained  to  cowardice, 
and  cowardice  links  itself  naturally  with  low  vices. 
Idleness  to  his  apprehension  is  paradise,  for  he 
works  without  hope  of  reward.  Thus  slavery 
robs  him  of  moral  force,  and  prepares  him  to  fall  a 
prey  to  appetite  and  passion. 

That  the  slave  finds  in  his  condition  little  nu 
triment  for  the  social  virtues  we  shall  easily 
understand,  if  we  consider  that  his  chief  relations 
are  to  an  absolute  master,  and  to  the  companions 
of  his  degrading  bondage,  that  is,  to  a  being  who 
wrongs  him,  and  to  associates  whom  he  cannot 
honor,  whom  he  sees  debased.  His  dependence 
on  his  owner  loosens  his  ties  to  all  other  beings. 
He  has  no  country  to  love,  no  family  to  call  his 
own,  no  objects  of  public  utility  to  espouse,  no 
impulse  to  generous  exertion.  The  relations,  de 
pendencies,  and  responsibilities,  by  which  Provi 
dence  forms  the  soul  to  a  deep,  disinterested  love, 
are  almost  struck  out  of  his  lot.  An  arbitrary 
rule,  a  foreign,  irresistible  will,  taking  him  out  of 


70 

his  own  hands,  and  placing  him  beyond  the 
natural  influences  of  society,  extinguishes  in  a 
great  degree  the  sense  of  what  is  due  to  himself, 
and  to  the  human  family  around  him. 

The  effects  of  slavery  on  the  character  are  so 
various,  that  this  part  of  the  discussion  might 
be  greatly  extended  ;  but  I  will  touch  only  on 
one  topic.  Let  us  turn,  for  a  moment,  to  the 
great  Motive  by  which  the  slave  is  made  to  labor. 
Labor,  in  one  form  or  another,  is  appointed  by 
God  for  man's  improvement  and  happiness,  and 
absorbs  the  chief  part  of  human  life,  so  that  the 
Motive  which  excites  to  it  has  immense  influence 
on  character.  It  determines  very  much,  whether 
life  shall  serve  or  fail  of  its  end.  The  man, 
who  works  from  honorable  motives,  from  domestic 
affections,  from  desire  of  a  condition  which  will 
open  to  him  greater  happiness  and  usefulness, 
finds  in  labor  an  exercise  and  invigoration  of 
virtue.  The  day-laborer,  who  earns,  with  horny 
hand  and  the  sweat  of  his  face,  coarse  food  for  a 
wife  and  children  whom  he  loves,  is  raised,  by 
this  generous  motive,  to  true  dignity ;  and,  though 
wanting  the  refinements  of  life,  is  a  nobler  being 
than  those  who  think  themselves  absolved  by 
wealth  from  serving  others.  Now  the  slave's 
labor  brings  no  dignity,  is  an  exercise  of  no  virtue, 
but  throughout  a  degradation  ;  so  that  one  of  God's 
chief  provisions  for  human  improvement  becomes 


71 

a  curse.  The  motive  from  which  he  acts  debases 
him.  It  is  the  Whip.  It  is  corporal  punishment. 
It  is  physical  pain  inflicted  by  a  fellow-creature. 
Undoubtedly  labor  is  mitigated  to  the  slave,  as  to 
all  men,  by  habit.  But  this  is  not  the  motive. 
Take  away  the  Whip,  and  he  would  be  idle. 
His  labor  brings  no  new  comforts  to  wife  or  child. 
The  motive  which  spurs  him  is  one  by  which  it  is 
base  to  be  swayed.  Stripes  are,  indeed,  resorted  to 
by  civil  government,  when  no  other  consideration 
will  deter  from  crime  ;  but  he,  who  is  deterred 
from  wrong  doing  by  the  whipping-post,  is  among 
the  most  fallen  of  his  race.  To  work  in  sight  of 
the  whip,  under  menace  of  blows,  is  to  be  ex 
posed  to  perpetual  insult  and  degrading  influences. 
Every  motion  of  the  limbs,  which  such  a  menace 
urges  is  a  wound  to  the  soul.  How  hard  must  it 
be  for  a  man  who  lives  under  the  lash  to  respect 
himself!  When  this  motive  is  substituted  for  all 
the  nobler  ones  which  God  ordains,  is  it  not 
almost  necessarily  death  to  the  better  and  higher 
sentiments  of  our  nature  ?  It  is  the  part  of  a  man 
to  despise  pain,  in  comparison  with  disgrace,  to 
meet  it  fearlessly  in  well  doing,  to  perform  the 
work  of  life  from  other  impulses.  It  is  the  part 
of  a  brute  to  be  governed  by  the  whip.  Even 
the  brute  is  seen  to  act  from  more  generous  incite 
ments.  The  horse  of  a  noble  breed  will  not 
endure  the  lash.  Shall  we  sink  man  below  the 
horse  ? 


72 

Let  it  not  be  said  that  blows  are  seldom  in 
flicted.  Be  it  so.  We  are  glad  to  know  it. 
But  this  is  not  the  point.  The  complaint  now 
urged  is  not  of  the  amount  of  the  pain  inflicted, 
but  of  its  influence  on  the  character  when  made 
the  great  motive  to  human  labor.  It  is  not  the 
endurance,  but  the  dread  of  the  whip,  it  is  the  sub 
stitution  of  this  for  natural  and  honorable  motives 
to  action,  which  we  abhor  and  condemn.  It 
matters  not  whether  few  or  many  are  whipped. 
A  blow  given  to  a  single  slave  is  a  stripe  on  the 
souls  of  all  who  see  or  hear  it.  It  makes  all 
abject,  servile.  It  is  not  of  the  wound  given  to 
the  flesh  of  which  we  now  complain.  Scar  the 
back,  and  you  have  done  nothing,  compared 
with  the  wrong  done  to  the  soul.  You  have 
either  stung  that  soul  with  infernal  passions,  with 
thirst  for  revenge;  or,  what  perhaps  is  more  dis 
couraging,  you  have  broken  and  brutalized  it. 
The  human  spirit  has  perished  under  your  hands, 
as  far  as  it  can  be  destroyed  by  human  force. 

I  know  it  is  sometimes  said,  in  reply  to  these 
remarks,  that  all  men,  as  well  as  slaves,  act 
from  necessity  ;  that  we  have  masters  in  hunger 
and  thirst;  that  no  man  loves  labor  for  itself; 
that  the  pains,  which  are  inflicted  on  us  by  the 
laws  of  nature,  the  elements,  and  seasons,  are 
so  many  lashes  driving  us  to  our  daily  task.  Be 
it  so.  Still  the  two  cases  are  essentially  different. 


73 

The  necessity  laid  on  us  by  natural  wants  is  most 
kindly  in  its  purpose.  It  is  meant  to  awaken  all 
our  faculties,  to  give  a  full  play  to  body  and  mind, 
and  thus  to  give  us  a  new  consciousness  of  the 
powers  derived  to  us  from  God.  We  are,  indeed, 
subjected  to  a  stern  nature ;  we  are  placed  amidst 
warring  elements,  scorching  heat,  withering  cold, 
storms,  blights,  sickness,  death.  And  what  is  the 
design  ?  To  call  forth  our  powers,  to  lay  on  us 
great  duties,  to  make  us  nobler  beings.  We  are 
placed  in  the  midst  of  a  warring  nature,  not 
to  yield  to  it,  not  to  be  its  slaves,  but  to  conquer 
it,  to  make  it  the  monument  of  our  skill  and 
strength,  to  arm  ourselves  with  its  elements,  its 
heat,  winds,  vapors,  and  mineral  treasures,  to  find, 
in  its  painful  changes,  occasions  and  incitements 
to  invention,  courage,  endurance,  mutual  and 
endearing  dependencies,  and  religious  trust. 
The  development  of  human  nature,  in  all  its 
powers  and  affections,  is  the  end  of  that  hard 
necessity  which  is  laid  on  us  by  nature.  Is  this 
one  and  the  same  thing  with  the  whip  laid  on  the 
slave  ?  Still  more  ;  it  is  the  design  of  nature 
that  by  energy,  skill,  and  self-denial  we  should 
so  far  anticipate  our  wants  or  accumulate  supplies, 
as  to  be  able  to  diminish  the  toil  of  the  hands,  and 
to  mix  with  it  more  intellectual  and  liberal  occu 
pations.  Nature  does  not  lay  on  us  an  unchange 
able  task,  but  one  which  we  may  all  lighten  by 


74 

honest,  self-denying  industry.  Thus  she  invites  us 
to  throw  off  her  yoke,  and  to  make  her  our  servant. 
Is  this  the  invitation  which  the  master  gives  his 
slaves  ?  Is  it  his  aim  to  awaken  the  powers  of  those 
on  whom  he  lays  his  burdens,  and  to  give  them 
increasing  mastery  over  himself?  Is  it  not  his  aim 
to  curb  their  will,  break  their  spirits,  and  shut 
them  up  for  ever  in  the  same  narrow  and  degrading 
work?  Oh,  let  not  nature  be  profaned,  let  not  her 
parental  rule  be  blasphemed,  by  comparing  with 
her  the  slaveholder ! 

2.  Having  considered  the  moral  influence  of 
slavery,  I  proceed  to  consider  its  Intellectual  influ 
ence,  another  great  topic.  God  gave  us  intellec 
tual  power,  that  it  should  be  cultivated;  and  a 
system  which  degrades  it,  and  can  only  be  upheld 
by  its  depression,  opposes  one  of  his  most  benevo 
lent  designs.  Reason  is  God's  image  in  man,  and 
the  capacity  of  acquiring  truth  is  among  his  best 
inspirations.  To  call  forth  the  intellect  is  a  prin 
cipal  purpose  of  the  circumstances  in  which  we  are 
placed,  of  the  child's  connexion  with  the  parent, 
and  of  the  necessity  laid  on  him  in  maturer  life  to 
provide  for  himself  and  others.  The  education  of 
the  intellect  is  not  confined  to  youth ;  but  the  vari 
ous  experience  of  later  years  does  vastly  more  than 
books  and  colleges  to  ripen  and  invigorate  the 
faculties. 


75 

Now,  the  whole  lot  of  the  slave  is  fitted  to  keep 
his  mind  in  childhood  and  bondage.  Though  living 
in  a  land  of  light,  few  beams  find  their  way  to  his 
benighted  understanding.  No  parent  feels  the  duty 
of  instructing  him.  No  teacher  is  provided  for 
him,  but  the  Driver,  who  breaks  him,  almost  in 
childhood,  to  the  servile  tasks  which  are  to  fill  up 
his  life.  No  book  is  opened  to  his  youthful  curi 
osity.  As  he  advances  in  years,  no  new  excite 
ments  supply  the  place  of  teachers.  He  is  not 
cast  on  himself,  made  to  depend  on  his  own  ener 
gies.  No  stirring  prizes  in  life  awaken  his  dormant 
faculties.  Fed  and  clothed  by  others  like  a  child, 
directed  in  every  step,  doomed  for  life  to  a  monoto 
nous  round  of  labor,  he  lives  and  dies  without  a 
spring  to  his  powers,  often  brutally  unconscious  of 
his  spiritual  nature.  Nor  is  this  all.  When  be 
nevolence  would  approach  him  with  instruction,  it 
is  repelled.  He  is  not  allowed  to  be  taught.  The 
light  is  jealously  barred  out.  The  voice,  which 
would  speak  to  him  as  a  man,  is  put  to  silence. 
He  must  not  even  be  enabled  to  read  the  Word 
of  God.  His  immortal  spirit  is  systematically 
crushed. 

It  is  said,  I  know,  that  the  ignorance  of  the  slave 
is  necessary  to  the  security  of  the  master,  and  the 
quiet  of  the  state  ;  and  this  is  said  truly.  Slavery 
and  knowledge  cannot  live  together.  To  enlighten 
the  slave  is  to  break  his  chain.  To  make  him 


76 

harmless,  he  must  be  kept  blind.  He  cannot  be 
left  to  read  in  an  enlightened  age,  without  endan 
gering  his  master  ;  for  what  can  he  read  which  will 
not  give,  at  least,  some  hint  of  his  wrongs  ?  Should 
his  eye  chance  to  fall  on  "  the  Declaration  of  Inde 
pendence,"  how  would  the  truth  glare  on  him, 
"  that  all  men  are  born  free  and  equal "  !  All 
knowledge  furnishes  arguments  against  slavery. 
From  every  subject  light  would  break  forth  to 
reveal  his  inalienable  and  outraged  rights.  The 
very  exercise  of  his  intellect  would  give  him  the 
consciousness  of  being  made  for  something  more 
than  a  slave.  I  agree  to  the  necessity  laid  on  his 
master  to  keep  him  in  darkness.  And  what  strong 
er  argument  against  slavery  can  be  conceived? 
It  compels  the  master  to  degrade,  systematically, 
the  mind  of  the  slave ;  to  war  against  human 
intelligence  ;  to  resist  that  improvement  which  is  the 
end  of  the  Creator.  "  Wo  to  him  that  taketh 
away  the  key  of  knowledge  !"  To  kill  the  body  is 
a  great  crime.  The  Spirit  we  cannot  kill,  but  we 
can  bury  it  in  deathlike  lethargy  ;  and  is  this  a 
light  crime  in  the  sight  of  its  Maker  ? 

Let  it  not  be  said,  that  almost  every  where  the 
laboring  classes  are  doomed  to  ignorance,  deprived 
of  the  means  of  instruction.  The  intellectual  ad 
vantages  of  the  laboring  freeman,  who  is  entrusted 
with  the  care  of  himself,  raise  him  far  above  the 
slave ;  and,  accordingly,  superior  minds  are  constantly 


77 

seen  to  issue  from  the  less  educated  classes.  Be 
sides,  in  free  communities,  philanthropy  is  not 
forbidden  to  labor  for  the  improvement  of  the 
ignorant.  The  obligation  of  the  prosperous  and 
instructed  to  elevate  their  less  favored  brethren  is 
taught,  and  not  taught  in  vain.  Benevolence  is 
making  perpetual  encroachments  on  the  domain  of 
ignorance  and  crime.  In  communities,  on  the  other 
hand,  cursed  with  slavery,  half  the  population, 
sometimes  more,  are  given  up,  intentionally  and 
systematically,  to  hopeless  ignorance.  To  raise 
this  mass  to  intelligence  and  self-government 
is  a  crime.  The  sentence  of  perpetual  degra 
dation  is  passed  on  a  large  portion  of  the  human 
race.  In  this  view,  how  great  the  ill  desert  of 
slavery  ! 

3.  1  proceed,  now,  to  the  Domestic  influences  of 
slavery  ;  and  here  we  must  look  for  a  dark  picture. 
Slavery  virtually  dissolves  the  domestic  relations. 
It  ruptures  the  most  sacred  ties  on  earth.  It  vio 
lates  home.  It  lacerates  the  best  affections.  The 
domestic  relations  precede,  and,  in  our  present 
existence,  are  worth  more  than  all  our  other  social 
lies.  They  give  the  first  throb  to  the  heart,  and 
unseal  the  deep  fountains  of  its  love.  Home  is  the 
chief  school  of  human  virtue.  Its  responsibilities, 
joys,  sorrows,  smiles,  tears,  hopes,  and  solicitudes, 
form  the  chief  interests  of  human  life.  Go  where 


78 


a  man  may,  home  is  the  centre  to  which  his  heart 
turns.  The  thought  of  his  home  nerves  his  arm 
and  lightens  his  toil.  For  that  his  heart  yearns, 
when  he  is  far  off.  There  he  garners  up  his  best 
treasures.  God  has  ordained  for  all  men  alike  the 
highest  earthly  happiness,  in  providing  for  all  the 
sanctuary  of  home.  But  the  slave's  home  does 
not  merit  the  name.  To  him  it  is  no  sanctuary. 
It  is  open  to  violation,  insult,  outrage.  His  children 
belong  to  another,  are  provided  for  by  another,  are 
disposed  of  by  another.  The  most  precious  burden 
with  which  the  heart  can  be  charged,  the  happi 
ness  of  his  child,  he  must  not  bear.  He  lives 
not  for  his  family,  but  for  a  stranger.  He  cannot 
improve  their  lot.  His  wife  and  daughter  he  can 
not  shield  from  insult.  They  may  be  torn  from  him 
at  another's  pleasure,  sold  as  beasts  of  burden,  sent 
he  knows  not  whither,  sent  where  he  cannot  reach 
them,  or  even  interchange  inquiries  and  messages 
of  love.  To  the  slave  marriage  has  no  sanctity. 
It  may  be  dissolved  in  a  moment  at  another's  will. 
His  wife,  son,  and  daughter  may  be  lashed  before 
his  eyes,  and  not  a  finger  must  be  lifted  in  their 
defence.  He  sees  the  scar  of  the  lash  on  his  wife 
and  child.  Thus  the  slave's  home  is  desecrated. 
Thus  the  tenderest  relations,  intended  by  God 
equally  for  all,  and  intended  to  be  the  chief  springs 
of  happiness  and  virtue,  are  sported  with  wantonly 
and  cruelly.  What  outrage  so  great  as  to  enter  a 


79 

man's  house,  and  tear  from  his  side  the  beings 
whom  God  has  bound  to  him  by  the  holiest  ties  ? 
Every  man  can  make  the  case  his  own.  Every 
mother  can  bring  it  home  to  her  own  heart. 

And  let  it  not  be  said  that  the  slave  has  not  the 
sensibilities  of  other  men.  Nature  is  too  strong 
even  for  slavery  to  conquer.  Even  the  brute  has 
the  yearnings  of  parental  love.  But  suppose  that 
the  conjugal  and  parental  ties  of  the  slave  may  be 
severed  without  a  pang.  What  a  curse  must  be 
slavery,  if  it  can  so  blight  the  heart  with  more  than 
brutal  insensibility,  if  it  can  sink  the  human  mother 
below  the  polar  she-bear,  which  "  howls  and  dies 
for  her  sundered  cub  ! "  But  it  does  not  and  cannot 
turn  the  slave  to  stone.  It  leaves,  at  least,  feeling 
enough  to  make  these  domestic  wrongs  occasions 
of  frequent  and  deep  suffering.  Still  it  must  do 
much  to  quench  the  natural  affections.  Can  the 
wife,  who  has  been  brought  under  influences  most 
unfriendly  to  female  purity  and  honor,  who  is 
exposed  to  the  whip,  who  may  be  torn  away  at 
her  master's  will,  and  whose  support  and  protection 
are  not  committed  to  a  husband's  faithfulness,  can 
such  a  wife,  if  the  name  may  be  given  her,  be 
loved  and  honored  as  a  woman  should  be  ?  Or  can 
the  love,  which  should  bind  together  man  and  his 
offspring,  be  expected,  under  an  institution,  which 
subverts,  in  a  great  degree,  filial  dependence  and 
parental  authority  and  care  ?  Slavery  withers  the 


80 

affections  and  happiness  of  home  at  their  very  root, 
by  tainting  female  purity.  Woman,  brought  up  in 
degradation,  placed  under  another's  power  and  at 
another's  disposal,  and  never  taught  to  look  for 
ward  to  the  happiness  of  an  inviolate,  honorable 
marriage,  can  hardly  possess  the  feelings  and  virtues 
of  her  sex.  A  blight  falls  on  her  in  her  early 
years.  Those  who  have  daughters  can  compre 
hend  her  lot.  In  truth,  licentiousness  among 
bond  and  free  is  the  natural  issue  of  all-pol 
luting  slavery.  Domestic  happiness  perishes  under 
its  touch,  both  among  bond  and  free. 

How  wonderful  is  it,  that  in  civilized  countries 
men  can  be  so  steeled  by  habit  as  to  invade  with 
out  remorse  the  peace,  purity,  and  sacred  relations 
of  domestic  life,  as  to  put  asunder  those  whom 
God  has  joined  together,  as  to  break  up  households 
by  processes  more  painful  than  death  !  And  this 
is  done  for  pecuniary  profit !  What !  Can  men, 
having  human  feeling,  grow  rich  by  the  desolation 
of  families?  We  hear  of  some  of  the  Southern 
States  enriching  themselves  by  breeding  slaves  for 
sale.  Of  all  the  licensed  occupations  of  society 
this  is  the  most  detestable.  What !  Grow  men, 
like  cattle !  Rear  human  families,  like  herds  of 
swine,  and  then  scatter  them  to  the  four  winds  for 
gain  !  Among  the  imprecations  uttered  by  man  on 
man,  is  there  one  more  fearful,  more  ominous, 
than  the  sighing  of  the  mother  bereft  of  her  child 


81 

by  unfeeling  cupidity  ?    If  blood  cry  to  God,  surely 
that  sigh  will  be  heard  in  heaven. 

Let  it  not  be  said  that  members  of  families  are 
often  separated  in  all  conditions  of  life.  Yes,  but 
separated  under  the  influence  of  love.  The  hus 
band  leaves  wife  and  children,  that  he  may  provide 
for  their  support,  and  carries  them  with  him  in  his 
heart  and  hopes.  The  sailor,  in  his  lonely  night- 
watch,  looks  homeward,  and  well  known  voices 
come  to  him  amidst  the  roar  of  the  waves.  The 
parent  sends  away  his  children,  but  sends  them  to 
prosper,  and  to  press  them  again  to  his  heart  with  a 
joy  enhanced  by  separation.  Are  such  the  separations 
which  slavery  makes  ?  And  can  he,  who  has  scat 
tered  other  families,  ask  God  to  bless  his  own  ? 

4.  I  proceed  to  another  important  view  of  the 
evils  of  slavery.  Slavery  produces  and  gives 
license  to  Cruelty.  By  this  it  is  not  meant  that 
cruelty  is  the  universal,  habitual,  unfailing  result. 
Thanks  to  God,  Christianity  has  not  entered  the 
world  in  vain.  Where  it  has  not  cast  down,  it  has 
mitigated  bad  institutions.  Slavery  in  this  country 
differs  widely  from  that  of  ancient  times,  and  from 
that  which  the  Spaniards  imposed  on  the  abori 
ginals  of  South  America.  There  is  here  an  in 
creasing  disposition  to  multiply  the  comforts  of  the 
slaves,  and  in  this  let  us  rejoice.  At  the  same 
time,  we  must  remember,  that,  under  the  light  of 
6 


82 

the  present  day,  and  in  a  country  where  Christianity 
and  the  rights  of  men  are  understood,  a  diminished 
severity  may  contain  more  guilt  than  the  ferocity 
of  darker  ages.  Cruelty  in  its  lighter  forms  is  now 
a  greater  crime  than  the  atrocious  usages  of  anti 
quity  at  which  we  shudder.  "  The  times  of  that 
ignorance  God  winked  at,  but  now  he  calleth  men 
every  where  to  repent."  It  should  also  be  consid 
ered  that  the  slightest  cruelty  to  the  slave  is  an 
aggravated  wrong,  because  he  is  unjustly  held  in 
bondage,  unjustly  held  as  property.  We  condemn 
the  man  who  enforces  harshly  a  righteous  claim. 
What,  then,  ought  we  to  think  of  lashing  and  scarring 
fellow-creatures,  for  the  purpose  of  upholding  an 
unrighteous,  usurped  power,  of  extorting  labor 
which  is  not  our  due  ? 

I  have  said  that  cruelty  is  not  the  habit  of  the 
slave  States  of  this  country.  Still,  that  it  is  frequent 
we  cannot  doubt.  Reports,  which  harrow  up  our 
souls,  come  to  us  from  that  quarter ;  and  we 
know  that  they  must  be  essentially  correct,  be 
cause  it  is  impossible  that  a  large  part,  perhaps 
the  majority,  of  the  population  of  a  country  can 
be  broken  to  passive,  unlimited  submission,  without 
examples  of  terrible  severity. 

Let  it  not  be  said,  as  is  sometimes  done, 
that  cruel  deeds  are  perpetrated  every  where 
else,  as  well  as  in  slave-countries.  Be  it  so; 
but  in  all  civilized  nations  unscourged  by 


83 

slavery,  a  principal  object  of  legislation  is  to 
protect  every  man  from  cruelty,  and  to  bring 
every  man  to  punishment,  who  wantonly  tortures 
or  wounds  another;  whilst  slavery  plucks  off 
restraint  from  the  ferocious,  or  leaves  them  to 
satiate  their  rage  with  impunity. — 'Let  it  not  be 
said  that  these  barbarities  are  regarded  no  where 
with  more  horror  than  at  the  South.  Be  it  so. 
They  are  abhorred,  but  allowed.  The  power  of 
individuals  to  lacerate  their  fellow-creatures  is 
given  to  them  by  the  community.  The  community 
abhors  the  abuse,  but  confers  the  power  which  will 
certainly  be  abused,  and  thus  strips  itself  of  all 
defence  before  the  bar  of  Almighty  Justice.  It 
must  answer  for  the  crimes  which  are  shielded  by 
its  laws.  —  Let  it  not  be  said,  that  these  cruelties 
are  checked  by  the  private  interest  of  the  slave 
holder.  Does  regard  to  private  interest  save  from 
brutal  treatment  the  draught-horse  in  our  streets  ? 
And  may  not  a  vast  amount  of  suffering  be  inflicted, 
which  will  not  put  in  peril  the  life  or  strength  of 
the  slave  ? 

To  substantiate  the  charge  of  cruelty,  I  shall  not, 
as  I  have  said,  have  recourse  to  current  reports, 
however  well  established.  I  am  willing  to  dismiss 
them  all  as  false.  I  stand  on  other  ground.  Re 
ports  may  lie,  but  our  daily  experience  of  human 
nature  cannot  lie.  I  summon  no  witnesses,  or 
rather  I  appeal  to  a  witness  every  where  present, 


84 

a  witness  in  every  heart.  Who  that  has  watched 
his  own  heart,  or  observed  others,  does  not  feel 
that  man  is  not  fit  to  be  trusted  with  absolute,  irre 
sponsible  power  over  men?  It  must  be  abused. 
The  selfish  passions  and  pride  of  our  nature  will  as 
surely  abuse  it,  as  the  storm  will  ravage,  or  the 
ocean  swell  and  roar  under  the  whirlwind.  A 
being,  so  ignorant,  so  headstrong,  so  passionate, 
as  man,  ought  not  to  be  trusted  with  this  terrible 
dominion.  He  ought  not  to  desire  it.  He  ought 
to  dread  it.  He  ought  to  cast  it  from  him,  as 
most  perilous  to  himself  and  others. 

Absolute  power  was  not  meant  for  man.  There 
is,  indeed,  an  exception  to  this  rule.  There  is  one 
case,  in  which  God  puts  a  human  being  wholly 
defenceless  into  another's  hands.  I  refer  to  the 
child,  who  is  wholly  subjected  to  the  parent's  will. 
But  observe  how  carefully,  I  might  almost  say  anx 
iously,  God  has  provided  against  the  abuse  of  this 
power.  He  has  raised  up  in  the  heart  of  the  parent 
a  friend,  a  guardian,  whom  the  mightiest  on  earth 
cannot  resist.  He  has  fitted  the  parent  for  this 
trust,  by  teaching  him  to  love  his  child  better  than 
himself.  No  eloquence  on  earth  is  so  subdu 
ing  as  the  moaning  of  the  infant  when  in  pain. 
No  reward  is  sweeter  than  that  infant's  smile.  We 
say,  God  has  put  the  infant  into  the  parent's  hands. 
Might  we  not  more  truly  say,  that  he  has  put  the 
parent  into  the  child's  power  ?  That  little  being 


85 

sends  forth  bis  father  to  toil,  and  makes  the  mother 
watch  over  him  by  day,  and  fix  on  him  her  sleep 
less  eyes  by  night.  No  tyrant  lays  such  a  yoke. 
Thus  God  has  fenced  and  secured  from  abuse  the 
power  of  the  parent ;  and  yet  even  the  parent  has 
been  known,  in  a  moment  of  passion,  to  be  cruel  to 
his  child.  Is  man,  then,  to  be  trusted  with  abso 
lute  power  over  a  fellow-creature,  who,  instead  of 
being  commended  by  nature  to  his  tenderest  love, 
belongs  to  a  despised  race,  is  regarded  as  property, 
is  made  the  passive  instrument  of  his  gratification 
and  gain  ?  I  ask  no  documents  to  prove  the  abuses 
of  this  power,  nor  do  I  care  what  is  said  to  disprove 
them.  Millions  may  rise  up  and  tell  me  that  the 
slave  suffers  little  from  cruelty.  I  know  too  much 
of  human  nature,  human  history,  human  passion  to 
believe  them.  I  acquit  slaveholders  of  all  peculiar 
depravity.  I  judge  them  by  myself.  I  say,  that 
absolute  power  always  corrupts  human  nature  more 
or  less.  I  say,  that  extraordinary,  almost  miracu 
lous  self-control  is  necessary  to  secure  the  slave 
holder  from  provocation  and  passion  ;  and  is  self- 
control  the  virtue  which  above  all  others  grows  up 
amidst  the  possession  of  irresponsible  dominion? 
Even  when  the  slaveholder  honestly  acquits  him 
self  of  cruelty,  he  may  be  criminal.  His  own 
consciousness  is  to  be  distrusted.  Having  begun 
with  wronging  the  slave,  with  wresting  from  him 
sacred  rights,  he  may  be  expected  to  multiply 


86 

wrongs,  without  thought.  The  degraded  state  of 
the  slave  may  induce  in  the  master  a  mode  of  treat 
ment  essentially  inhuman  and  insulting,  but  which 
he  never  dreams  to  be  cruel.  The  influence  of 
slavery  in  indurating  the  moral  feeling  and  blinding 
men  to  wrongs  is  one  of  its  worst  evils. 

But  suppose  the  master  to  be  ever  so  humane. 
Still,  he  is  not  always  watching  over  his  slave.  He 
has  his  pleasures  to  attend  to.  He  is  often  absent. 
His  terrible  power  must  be  delegated.  And  to 
whom  is  it  delegated  ?  To  men  prepared  to  gov 
ern  others,  by  having  learned  to  govern  them 
selves  ?  To  men  having  a  deep  interest  in  the 
slaves?  To  wise  men,  instructed  in  human  nature  ? 
To  Christians,  trained  to  purity  and  love  ?  Who 
does  not  know,  that  the  office  of  Overseer  is  among 
the  last,  which  an  enlightened,  philanthropic,  self- 
respecting  man  would  choose  ?  Who  does  not 
know,  how  often  the  overseer  pollutes  the  planta 
tion  by  his  licentiousness,  as  well  as  scourges  it  by 
his  severity  ?  In  the  hands  of  such  a  man  the  lash 
is  placed.  To  such  a  man  is  committed  the  most 
fearful  trust  on  earth  !  For  his  cruelties  the  master 
must  answer,  as  truly  as  if  they  were  his  own. 
Nor  is  this  all.  The  master  does  more  than  dele 
gate  his  power  to  the  overseer.  How  often  does  he 
part  with  it  wholly  to  the  slave-dealer  !  And  has  he 
weighed  the  responsibility  of  such  a  transfer  ?  Does 
he  not  know,  that,  in  selling  his  slaves  into  merciless 


87 

hands,  he  is  merciless  himself,  and  must  give  an 
account  to  God  for  every  barbarity  of  which  they 
become  the  victims  ?  The  notorious  cruelty  of  the 
slave-dealers  can  be  no  false  report,  for  it  belongs 
to  their  vocation.  These  are  the  men,  who  throng 
and  defile  our  Seat  of  Government,  whose  slave- 
markets  and  slave-dungeons  turn  to  mockery  the 
language  of  freedom  in  the  halls  of  Congress,  and 
who  make  us  justly  the  by-word  and  the  scorn  of 
the  nations.  Is  there  no  cruelty  in  putting 
slaves  under  the  bloody  lash  of  the  slave-dealer,  to 
be  driven  like  herds  of  cattle  to  distant  regions,  and 
there  to  pass  into  the  hands  of  strangers,  without  a 
pledge  of  their  finding  justice  or  mercy  ?  What 
heart,  not  seared  by  custom,  would  not  recoil  from 
such  barbarity  ? 

It  has  been  seen  that  I  do  not  ground  my  argu 
ment  at  all  on  cases  of  excessive  cruelty.  I  should 
attach  less  importance  to  these  than  do  most  per 
sons,  even  were  they  more  frequent.  They  form 
a  very,  very  small  amount  of  suffering,  compar 
ed  with  what  is  inflicted  by  abuses  of  power  too 
minute  for  notice.  Blows,  insults,  privations,  which 
make  no  noise,  and  leave  no  scar,  are  incompara 
bly  more  destructive  of  happiness  than  a  few  bru 
tal  violences  which  move  general  indignation.  A 
weak,  despised  being,  having  no  means  of  defence 
or  redress,  living  in  a  community  armed  against  his 
rights,  regarded  as  property,  and  as  bound  to  entire, 


88 

unresisting  compliance  with  another's  will,  if  not 
subjected  to  inflictions  of  ferocious  cruelty,  is  yet 
exposed  to  less  striking  and  shocking  forms  of  cru 
elty,  the  amount  of  which  must  be  a  fearful  mass 
of  suffering. 

But  could  it  be  proved  that  there  are  no 
cruelties  in  slave-countries,  we  ought  not  then  to 
be  more  reconciled  to  slavery  than  we  now  are. 
For  what  would  this  show?  That  cruelty  is  not 
needed.  And  why  not  needed?  Because  the  slave 
is  entirely  subdued  to  his  lot.  No  man  will  be 
wholly  unresisting  in  bondage,  but  he  who  is 
thoroughly  imbued  with  the  spirit  of  a  slave.  If 
the  colored  race  never  need  punishment,  it  is 
because  the  feelings  of  men  are  dead  within  them, 
because  they  have  no  consciousness  of  rights, 
because  they  are  cowards,  without  respect  for 
themselves,  and  without  confidence  in  the  sharers 
of  their  degraded  lot.  The  quiet  of  slavery  is  like 
that  which  the  Roman  legions  left  in  ancient 
Britain,  the  stillness  of  death.  Why  were  the 
Romans  accustomed  to  work  their  slaves  in  chains 
by  day,  and  confine  them  in  dungeons  by  night? 
Not  because  they  loved  cruelty  for  its  own  sake  ; 
but  because  their  slaves  were  stung  with  a  con 
sciousness  of  degradation,  because  they  brought 
from  the  forests  of  Dacia  some  rude  ideas  of  human 
dignity,  or  from  civilized  countries  some  experience 
of  social  improvements,  which  naturally  issued  in 


89 

violence  and  exasperation.  They  needed  cruelty, 
for  their  own  wills  were  not  broken  to  another's, 
and  the  spirit  of  freemen  was  not  wholly  gone. 
The  slave  must  meet  cruel  treatment  either  in 
wardly  or  outwardly.  Either  the  soul  or  the  body 
must  receive  the  blow7.  Either  the  flesh  must  be 
tortured  or  the  spirit  be  struck  down.  Dreadful 
alternative  to  which  slavery  is  reduced  ! 

5.  I  proceed  to  one  more  view  of  the  evils  of 
slavery.  I  refer  to  its  influence  on  the  Master. 
This  topic  cannot,  perhaps,  be  so  handled  as  to 
avoid  giving  offence  ;  but  without  it  an  imperfect 
view  of  the  subject  would  be  given.  I  will  pass  over 
many  views.  I  will  say  nothing  of  the  tendency 
of  slavery  to  unsettle  the  ideas  of  Right  in  the  slave 
holder,  to  impair  his  convictions  of  Justice  and 
Benevolence  ;  or  of  its  tendency  to  associate  with 
labor  ideas  of  degradation,  and  to  recommend  idle 
ness  as  an  honorable  exemption.  I  will  confine 
myself  to  two  considerations. 

The  first  is,  that  slavery,  above  all  other  influ 
ences,  nourishes  the  passion  for  power  and  its 
kindred  vices.  There  is  no  passion  which  needs  a 
stronger  curb.  Men's  worst  crimes  have  sprung  from 
the  desire  of  being  masters,  of  bending  others  to  their 
yoke.  And  the  natural  tendency  of  bringing 
others  into  subjection  to  our  absolute  will  is 
to  quicken  into  fearful  activity  the  imperious. 


90 

haughty,  proud,  self-seeking  propensities  of  our 
nature.  Man  cannot,  without  imminent  peril  to 
his  virtue,  own  a  fellow-creature,  or  use  the  word 
of  absolute  command  to  his  brethren.  God 
never  delegated  this  power.  It  is  an  usurpation 
of  the  Divine  dominion,  and  its  natural  influence  is 
to  produce  a  spirit  of  superiority  to  divine  as  well 
as  to  human  laws. 

Undoubtedly  this  tendency  is  in  a  measure 
counteracted  by  the  spirit  of  the  age  and  the 
genius  of  Christianity,  and  in  conscientious 
individuals  it  may  be  wholly  overcome  ;  but 
we  see  its  fruits  in  the  corruptions  of  moral 
sentiment  which  prevail  among  slaveholders. 
A  quick  resentment  of  whatever  is  thought  to 
encroach  on  personal  dignity,  a  trembling  jeal 
ousy  of  reputation,  vehemence  of  the  vindictive 
passions,  and  contempt  of  all  laws,  human  and 
divine,  in  retaliating  injury,  —  these  take  rank 
among  the  virtues  of  men  whose  self-estimation 
has  been  fed  by  the  possession  of  absolute  power. 

Of  consequence  the  direct  tendency  of  sla 
very  is  to  annihilate  the  control  of  Christianity. 
Humility  is  by  eminence  the  spirit  of  Christianity. 
No  vice  was  so  severely  rebuked  by  our  Lord,  as 
the  passion  for  ruling  over  others.  A  deference 
towards  all  human  beings  as  our  brethren,  a  benev 
olence  which  disposes  us  to  serve  rather  than  to 
reign,  to  concede  our  own  rather  than  to  encroach 


91 


on  others'  rights,  to  forgive,  not  avenge  wrongs,  to 
govern  our  own  spirits  instead  of  breaking  the 
spirit  of  an  inferior  or  foe,  —  this  is  Christianity  ; 
a  religion  too  high  and  pure  to  be  understood  and 
obeyed  any  where  as  it  should  be,  .but  which 
meets  singular  hostility  in  the  habits  of  mind 
generated  by  slavery. 

The  slaveholder,  indeed,  values  himself  on  his 
loftiness  of  spirit.  He  has  a  consciousness  of 
dignity,  which  imposes  on  himself  and  others. 
But  truth  cannot  stoop  to  this  lofty  mien.  Truth, 
moral,  Christian  truth,  condemns  it,  and  con 
demns  those  who  bow  to  it.  Self-respect,  found 
ed  on  a  consciousness  of  our  moral  nature  and 
immortal  destiny, is,  indeed,  a  noble  principle;  but 
this  sentiment  includes,  as  a  part  of  itself,  respect 
for  all  who  partake  our  nature.  A  consciousness 
of  dignity,  founded  on  the  subjection  of  others  to 
our  absolute  will,  is  inhuman  and  unjust.  It  is 
time  that  the  teachings  of  Christ  were  understood. 
In  proportion  as  a  man  acquires  a  lofty  bearing 
from  the  habit  of  command  over  wronged  and 
depressed  fellow-creatures,  so  far  he  casts  away 
true  honor,  so  far  he  has  fallen  in  the  sight  of  God 
and  Virtue. 

I  approach  a  more  delicate  subject,  and  one  on 
which  I  shall  not  enlarge.  To  own  the  persons  of 
others,  to  hold  females  in  slavery,  is  necessarily 
fatal  to  the  purity  of  a  people.  That  unprotected 


92 

females,  stripped  by  their  degraded  condition  of 
woman's  self-respect,  should  be  used  to  minister  to 
other  passions  in  men  than  the  love  of  gain,  is  next 
to  inevitable.  Accordingly,  in  such  a  community 
the  reins  .are  given  to  youthful  licentiousness. 
Youth,  every  where  in  perils,  is  in  these  circum 
stances  urged  to  vice  with  a  terrible  power. 
And  the  evil  cannot  stop  at  youth.  Early  licen 
tiousness  is  fruitful  of  crime  in  mature  life.  How 
far  the  obligation  to  conjugal  fidelity,  the  sacred- 
ness  of  domestic  ties,  will  be  revered  amidst  such 
habits,  such  temptations,  such  facilities  to  vice,  as 
are  involved  in  slavery,  needs  no  exposition. 
So  terrible  is  the  connexion  of  crimes  !  They, 
who  invade  the  domestic  rights  of  others,  suffer  in 
their  own  homes.  The  household  of  the  slave 
may  be  broken  up  arbitrarily  by  the  master ;  but 
he  finds  his  revenge,  if  revenge  he  asks,  in  the 
blight  which  the  master's  unfaithfulness  sheds 
over  his  own  domestic  joys.  A  slave-country 
reeks  with  licentiousness.  It  is  tainted  with  a 
deadlier  pestilence  than  the  plague. 

But  the  worst  is  not  told.  As  a  consequence 
of  criminal  connexions,  many  a  master  has  children 
born  into  slavery.  Of  these,  most,  I  presume, 
receive  protection,  perhaps  indulgence,  during  the 
life  of  the  fathers ;  but  at  their  death  not  a  few 
are  left  to  the  chances  of  a  cruel  bondage.  These 
cases  must  have  increased,  since  the  difficul- 


ties  of  emancipation  have  even  multiplied.  Still 
more,  it  is  to  be  feared,  that  there  are  cases,  in 
which  the  master  puts  his  own  children  under  the 
whip  of  the  overseer,  or  else  sells  them  to  undergo 
the  miseries  of  bondage  among  strangers.  I 
should  rejoice  to  learn  that  my  impressions  on  this 
point  are  false.  If  they  be  true,  then  our  own 
country,  calling  itself  enlightened  and  Christian,  is 
defiled  with  one  of  the  greatest  enormities  on 
earth.  We  send  missionaries  to  heathen  lands. 
Among  the  pollutions  of  heathenism  I  know 
nothing  worse  than  this.  The  heathen,  who 
feasts  on  his  country's  foe,  may  hold  up  his  head 
by  the  side  of  the  Christian  who  sells  his  child 
for  gain,  sells  him  to  be  a  slave.  God  forbid  that 
I  should  charge  this  crime  on  a  people  !  But 
however  rarely  it  may  occur,  it  is  a  fruit  of 
slavery,  an  exercise  of  power  belonging  to  slavery, 
and  no  laws  restrain  or  punish  it.  Such  are  the 
evils  which  spring  naturally  from  the  licentious 
ness  generated  by  slavery. 

I  have  now  placed  before  the  reader  the  chief 
evils  of  slavery.  We  are  told,  however,  that 
these  are  not  without  mitigation,  that  slavery  has 
advantages  which  do  much  to  counterbalance  its 
wrongs  and  pains.  Not  a  few  are  partially  recon 
ciled  to  the  institution  by  the  language  of  confi 
dence  in  which  its  benefits  are  sometimes  an- 


94 

nounced.  I  shall  therefore  close  this  chapter 
with  a  very  brief  consideration  of  what  are  thought 
to  be  the  advantages  of  slavery. 

It  is  often  said,  that  the  slave  does  less  work 
than  the  free  laborer.  He  bears  a  lighter  burden 
than  liberty  would  lay  on  him.  Perhaps  this  is 
generally  true  ;  yet  when  circumstances  promise 
profit  to  the  master  from  the  imposition  of  exces 
sive  labor,  the  slave  is  not  spared.  In  the  West 
Indies,  the  terrible  waste  of  life  among  the  over 
worked  cultivators  required  large  supplies  from 
Africa  to  keep  up  the  failing  population.  In  this 
country  it  is  probably  true  that  the  slave  works 
less  than  the  free  laborer  ;  but  it  does  not  there 
fore  follow  that  his  work  is  lighter.  For  what  is 
it  that  lightens  toil  ?  It  is  Hope  ;  it  is  Love ;  it  is 
Strong  Motive.  That  labor  is  light,  which  we  do 
from  the  heart ;  to  which  a  great  good  quickens 
us ;  which  is  to  better  our  lot.  That  labor  is  light, 
which  is  to  comfort,  adorn,  and  cheer  our  homes, 
to  give  instruction  to  our  children,  to  solace  the 
declining  years  of  a  parent,  to  give  to  our  grateful 
and  generous  sentiments  the  means  of  exertion. 
Great  effort  from  great  motives  is  the  best  defi 
nition  of  a  happy  life.  The  easiest  labor  is  a 
burden  to  him  who  has  no  motive  for  performing 
it.  How  wearisome  is  'the  task  imposed  by 
another,  and  wrongfully  imposed  ?  The  slave 
cannot  easily  be  made  to  do  a  freeman's  work ; 


95 

and  why?  because  he  wants  a  freeman's  spirit, 
because  the  spring  of  labor  is  impaired  within  him, 
because  he  works  as  a  machine,  not  a  free  agent. 
The  compulsion,  under  which  he  toils  for  another, 
takes  from  labor  its  sweetness,  makes  the  daily 
round  of  life  arid  and  dull,  makes  escape  from 
toil  the  chief  interest  of  life. 

We  are  farther  told  that  the  slave  is  freed  from 
all  care,  that  he  is  sure  of  future  support,  that 
when  old  he  is  not  dismissed  to  the  poor-house, 
but  fed  and  sheltered  in  his  own  hut.  This  is 
true  ;  but  it  is  also  true  that  nothing  can  be 
gained  by  violating  the  great  laws  and  essential 
rights  of  our  nature.  The  slave,  we  are  told,  has 
no  care,  his  future  is  provided  for.  Yet  God 
created  him  to  provide  for  the  future,  to  take  care 
of  hisown  happiness  ;  and  he  cannot  be  freed  from 
this  care  without  injury  to  his  moral  and  intellect 
ual  life.  Why  has  God  given  foresight  and 
power  over  the  future,  but  to  be  used  ?  Is  it  a 
blessing  to  a  rational  creature,  to  be  placed  in  a 
condition  which  chains  his  faculties  to  the  present 
moment,  which  leaves  nothing  before  him  to  rouse 
the  intellect  or  touch  the  heart  ?  Be  it  also 
remembered,  that  the  same  provision,  w7hich  re 
lieves  the  slave  from  anxiety,  cuts  him  off  from 
hope.  The  future  is  not,  indeed,  haunted  by 
spectres  of  poverty,  nor  is  it  brightened  by  images 
of  joy.  It  stretches  before  him  sterile,  monoto- 


96 

nous,  expanding  into   no  refreshing  verdure,    and 
sending  no  cheering  whisper  of  a  better  lot. 

It  is  true  that  the  free  laborer  may  become  a 
pauper  ;  and  so  may  the  free  rich  man,  both  of 
the  North  and  the  South.  Still,  our  capitalists 
never  dream  of  flying  to  slavery  as  a  security 
against  the  almshouse.  Freedom  undoubtedly 
has  its  perils.  It  offers  nothing  to  the  slothful  and 
dissolute.  Among  a  people  left  to  seek  their  own 
good  in  their  own  way,  some  of  all  classes  fail  from 
vice,  some  from  incapacity,  some  from  misfortune. 
All  classes  will  furnish  members  to  the  body  of  the 
poor.  But  in  this  country  the  number  is  small,  and 
ought  constantly  to  decrease.  The  evil,  however 
lamentable,  is  not  so  remediless  and  spreading  as 
to  furnish  a  motive  for  reducing  half  the  population 
to  chains.  Benevolence  does  much  to  mitigate  it. 
The  best  minds  are  inquiring  how  it  rnay  be 
prevented,  diminished,  removed.  It  is  giving 
excitement  to  a  philanthropy  which  creates  out 
of  misfortune  new  bonds  of  union  between  man 
and  man. 

Our  slave-holding  brethren,  who  tell  us  that  the 
condition  of  the  slave  is  better  than  that  of  the 
free  laborer  at  the  North,  talk  ignorantly  and 
rashly.  They  do  not,  cannot  know,  what  to  us  is 
matter  of  daily  observation,  that  from  the  families 
of  our  farmers  and  mechanics  have  sprung  our 
most  distinguished  men,  men  who  have  done  most 


97 

for  science,  arts,  letters,  religion,  and  freedom  ;  and 
that  the  noblest  spirits  among  us  would  have  been 
lost  to  their  country  and  mankind,  had  the  laboring 
class  here  been  doomed  to  slavery.  They  do 
not  know,  what  we  rejoice  to  tell  them,  that  this 
class  partakes  largely  of  the  impulse  given  to  the 
whole  community  ;  that  the  means  of  intellectual 
improvement  are  multiplying  to  the  laborious  as 
fast  as  to  the  opulent ;  that  our  most  distinguished 
citizens  meet  them  as  brethren,  and  communicate 
to  them  in  public  discourses  their  own  most  impor 
tant  acquisitions.  Undoubtedly,  the  Christian,  re 
publican  spirit  is  not  working,  even  here,  as  it 
should.  The  more  improved  and  prosperous 
classes  have  not  yet  learned  that  it  is  their  great 
mission  to  elevate  morally  and  intellectually  the 
less  advanced  classes  of  the  community  ;  but  the 
great  truth  is  more  and  more  recognised,  and 
accordingly  a  new  era  may  be  said  to  be  opening 
on  society. 

It  is  said,  however,  that  the  slave,  if  not  to  be 
compared  to  the  free  laborer  at  the  North,  is  in 
a  happier  condition  than  the  Irish  peasantry.  Let 
this  be  granted.  Let  the  security  of  the  peasant's 
domestic  relations,  let  his  church,  and  his  school- 
house,  and  his  faint  hope  of  a  better  lot  pass  for 
nothing.  Because  Ireland  is  suffering  from  the  mis- 
government  and  oppression  of  ages,  does  it  follow 
that  a  less  grinding  oppression  is  a  good  ?  Besides, 
7 


98 

are  not  the  wrongs  of  Ireland  acknowledged  ?  Is 
not  British  legislation  laboring  to  restore  her  pros 
perity?  Is  it  not  true,  that,  whilst  the  slave's  lot 
admits  no  important  change,  the  most  enlightened 
minds  are  at  work  to  confer  on  the  Irish  peasant 
the  blessings  of  education,  of  equal  laws,  of  new 
springs  to  exertion,  of  new  sources  of  wealth? 
Other  men,  however  fallen,  may  be  lifted  up. 
An  immovable  weight  presses  on  the  slave. 

But  still  we  are  told  the  slave  is  gay.  He  is 
not  as  wretched  as  our  theories  teach.  After  his 
toil,  he  sings,  he  dances,  he  gives  no  signs  of  an 
exhausted  frame  or  gloomy  spirit.  The  slave 
happy  !  Why,  then,  contend  for  Rights  ?  Why 
follow  with  beating  hearts  the  struggles  of  the 
patriot  for  freedom  ?  Why  canonize  the  martyr 
to  freedom?  The  slave  happy!  Then  happi 
ness  is  to  be  found  in  giving  up  the  distinctive 
attributes  of  a  man  ;  in  darkening  intellect  and 
conscience  ;  in  quenching  generous  sentiments: 
in  servility  of  spirit ;  in  living  under  a  whip  ;  in 
having  neither  property  nor  rights;  in  holding  wife 
and  child  at  another's  pleasure  ;  in  toiling  without 
hope  ;  in  living  without  an  end  !  The  slave,  indeed, 
has  his  pleasures.  His  animal  nature  survives  the 
injury  to  his  rational  and  moral  powers;  and 
every  animal  has  its  enjoyments.  The  kindness 
of  Providence  allows  no  human  being  to  be  wholly 
divorced  from  good.  The  lamb  frolics  ;  the  dog 


99 


leaps  for  joy ;  the  bird  fills  the  air  with  cheerful 
harmony  ;  and  the  slave  spends  his  holiday  in 
laughter  and  the  dance.  Thanks  to  Him  who 
never  leaves  himself  without  witness  ;  who  cheers 
even  the  desert  with  spots  of  verdure  ;  and  opens 
a  fountain  of  joy  in  the  most  withered  heart !  It 
is  not  possible,  however,  to  contemplate  the  occa 
sional  gayety  of  the  slave  without  some  mixture  of 
painful  thought.  He  is  gay,  because  he  has  not 
learned  to  think  ;  because  he  is  too  fallen  to  feel  his 
wrongs  ;  because  he  wants  just  self-respect.  We 
are  grieved  by  the  gayety  of  the  insane.  There  is 
a  sadness  in  the  gayety  of  him,  whose  lightness  of 
heart  would  be  turned  to  bitterness  and  indigna 
tion,  were  one  ray  of  light  to  awaken  in  him  the 
spirit  of  a  man. 

That  there  are  those  among  the  free,  who  are 
more  wretched  than  slaves,  is  undoubtedly  true ; 
just  as  there  is  incomparably  greater  misery  among 
men  than  among  brutes.  The  brute  never  knew 
the  agony  of  a  human  spirit  torn  by  remorse  or 
wounded  in  its  love.  But  would  we  cease  to  be 
human,  because  our  capacity  for  suffering  in 
creases  with  the  elevation  of  our  nature  ?  All 
blessings  may  be  perverted,  and  the  greatest  per 
verted  most.  Were  we  to  visit  a  slave-country, 
undoubtedly  the  most  miserable  human  beings 
would  be  found  among  the  free  ;  for  among  them 
the  passions  have  wider  sweep,  and  the  power 


100 


they  possess  may  be  used  to  their  own  ruin. 
Liberty  is  not  a  necessity  of  happiness.  It  is 
only  a  means  of  good.  It  is  a  trust  which  may  be 
abused.  Are  all  such  trusts  to  be  cast  away  ? 
Are  they  not  the  greatest  gifts  of  Heaven  ? 

But  the  slave,  we  are  told,  often  manifests 
affection  to  his  master,  grieves  at  his  departure, 
and  welcomes  his  return.  I  will  not  endeavour 
to  explain  this,  by  saying  that  the  master's 
absence  places  the  slave  under  the  overseer. 
Nor  will  I  object,  that  the  slave's  propensity  to 
steal  from  his  master,  his  need  of  the  whip  to 
urge  him  to  toil,  and  the  dread  of  insurrection 
which  he  inspires,  are  signs  of  any  thing  but 
love.  There  is,  undoubtedly,  much  more  af 
fection  in  this  relation  than  could  be  expected. 
Of  all  races  of  men,  the  African  is  the  mildest 
and  most  susceptible  of  attachment.  He  loves, 
where  the  European  would  hate.  He  watches 
the  life  of  a  master,  whom  the  North-American 
Indian,  in  like  circumstances,  would  stab  to  the 
heart.  The  African  is  affectionate.  Is  this  a 
reason  for  holding  him  in  chains  ?  We  cannot, 
however,  think  of  this  most  interesting  feature  of 
slavery  with  unmixed  pleasure.  It  is  the  curse  of 
slavery,  that  it  can  touch  nothing  which  it  does  not 
debase.  Even  love,  that  sentiment  given  us  by 
God  to  be  the  germ  of  a  divine  virtue,  becomes  in 
the  slave  a  weakness,  almost  a  degradation.  His 


101 

affections  lose  much  of  their  beauty  and  dignity. 
He  ought,  indeed,  to  feel  benevolence  towards 
his  master ;  but  to  attach  himself  to  a  man 
who  keeps  him  in  the  dust  and  denies  him 
the  rights  of  a  man ;  to  be  grateful  and  devoted 
to  one  who  extorts  his  toil  and  debases  him 
into  a  chattel ;  this  has  a  taint  of  servility, 
which  makes  us  grieve  whilst  we  admire.  How 
ever,  we  would  not  diminish  the  attachment 
of  the  slave.  He  is  the  happier  for  his  gener 
osity.  Let  him  love  his  master,  and  let  the 
master  win  love  by  kindness.  We  only  say, 
let  not  this  manifestation  of  a  generous  nature  in 
the  slave  be  turned  against  him.  Let  it  not  be 
made  an  answer  to  an  exposition  of  his  wrongs. 
Let  it  not  be  used  as  a  weapon  for  his  perpetual 
degradation. 

But  the  slave,  we  are  told,  is  taught  Religion. 
This  is  the  most  cheering  sound  which  comes  to 
us  from  the  land  of  bondage.  We  are  rejoiced 
to  learn  that  any  portion  of  the  slaves  are  in 
structed  in  that  truth,  which  gives  inward  freedom. 
They  hear  at  least  one  voice  of  deep,  genuine 
love,  the  voice  of  Christ ;  and  read  in  his  cross 
what  all  other  things  hide  from  them,  the  unut 
terable  worth  of  their  spiritual  nature.  This 
portion,  however,  is  small.  The  greater  part 
are  still  buried  in  heathen  ignorance.  Besides, 
Religion,  though  a  great  good,  can  hardly  exert 


102 

its  full  power  on  the  slave.  Will  it  not  be 
taught  to  make  him  obedient  to  his  master,  rather 
than  to  raise  him  to  the  dignity  of  a  man  ?  Is 
slavery,  which  tends  so  proverbially  to  debase  the 
mind,  the  preparation  for  spiritual  truth  ?  Can 
the  slave  comprehend  the  principle  of  Love, 
the  essential  principle  of  Christianity,  when  he 
hears  it  from  the  lips  of  those  whose  relations  to 
him  express  injustice  and  selfishness  ?  But  sup 
pose  him  to  receive  Christianity  in  its  purity,  and 
to  feel  all  its  power.  Is  this  to  reconcile  us  to 
slavery  ?  Is  a  being,  who  can  understand  the 
sublimest  truth  which  has  ever  entered  the 
human  mind,  who  can  love  and  adore  God,  who 
can  conform  himself  to  the  celestial  virtue  of  the 
Saviour,  for  whom  that  Saviour  died,  to  whom 
heaven  is  opened,  whose  repentance  now  gives 
joy  in  heaven,  —  is  such  a  being  to  be  held  as 
property,  driven  by  force  as  the  brute,  and  denied 
the  rights  of  man  by  a  fellow-creature,  by  a  pro 
fessed  disciple  of  the  just  and  merciful  Saviour  ? 
Has  he  a  religious  nature,  and  dares  any  one 
hold  him  as  a  slave  ? 

I  have  now  completed  my  views  of  the  evils  of 
slavery,  and  have  shown  how  little  they  are  miti 
gated  by  what  are  thought  its  advantages.  In  this 
whole  discussion  I  have  cautiously  avoided  quoting 
particular  examples  of  its  baneful  influences.  I 


103 

have  not  brought  together  accounts  of  horrible 
cruelty  which  come  to  us  from  the  South.  I  have 
confined  myself  to  the  natural  tendencies  of  sla 
very,  to  evils  bound  up  in  its  very  nature,  which, 
as  long  as  man  is  man,  cannot  be  separated  from 
it.  That  these  evils  are  unmixed  or  universal,  I 
do  not  say.  There  are  and  must  be  exceptions 
to  them,  and  more  or  less  of  good  may  often  be 
found  in  connexion  with  them.  No  institution,  be 
it  what  it  may,  can  make  the  life  of  a  human  being 
wholly  evil,  or  cut  off  every  means  of  improve 
ment.  God's  benevolence  triumphs  over  all  the 
perverseness  and  folly  of  man's  devices.  He 
sends  a  cheering  beam  into  the  darkest  abode. 
The  slave  has  his  hours  of  exhilaration.  His  hut 
occasionally  rings  with  thoughtless  mirth.  Among 
this  class,  too,  there  are  and  must  be,  occasionally, 
higher  pleasures.  God  is  no  respecter  of  per 
sons  ;  and  in  some  slaves  there  is  a  happy  nature 
which  no  condition  can  destroy,  just  as  among 
children  we  find  some  whom  the  worst  education 
cannot  spoil.  The  African  is  so  affectionate, 
imitative,  and  docile,  that  in  favorable  circum 
stances  he  catches  much  that  is  good  ;  and  accord 
ingly  the  influence  of  a  wise  and  kind  master  will 
be  seen  in  the  very  countenance  and  bearing  of 
his  slaves.  Among  this  degraded  people,  there 
are,  occasionally,  examples  of  superior  intelligence 
and  virtue,  showing  the  groundlessness  of  the 


104 

opinion  that  they  are  incapable  of  filling  a  higher 
rank  than  slavery,  and  showing  that  human  nature 
is  too  generous  and  hardy  to  be  wholly  destroyed 
in  the  most  unpropitious  state.  We  also  witness 
in  this  class,  and  very  often,  a  superior  physical 
development,  a  grace  of  form  and  motion,  which 
almost  extorts  a  feeling  approaching  respect.  I 
mean  not  to  affirm  that  slavery  excludes  all  good, 
for  human  life  cannot  long  endure  under  the  pri 
vation  of  every  thing  happy  and  improving.  I 
have  spoken  of  its  natural  tendencies  and  results. 
These  are  wholly  and  only  evil. 

I  am  aware  that  it  will  be  replied  to  the  views 
now  given  of  slavery,  that  persons  living  at  a  dis 
tance  from  it  cannot  comprehend  it,  that  its  true 
character  can  be  learned  only  from  those,  who, 
know  it  practically,  and  are  familiar  with  its  ope 
rations.  To  this  I  will  not  reply,  that  1  have  seen 
it  near  at  hand.  It  is  sufficient  to  reply,  that  men 
may  lose  the  power  of  seeing  an  object  fairly,  by 
being  too  near  as  well  as  by  being  too  remote. 
The  slaveholder  is  too  familiar  with  slavery  to 
understand  it.  To  be  educated  in  injustice,  is 
almost  necessarily  to  be  blinded  by  it  more  or 
less.  To  exercise  usurped  power  from  birth,  is 
the  surest  way  to  look  upon  it  as  a  right  and  a 
good.  The  slaveholder  tells  us  that  he  only  can 
instruct  us  about  slavery.  But  suppose  that  we 
wished  to  learn  the  true  character  of  despotism ; 


105 

should  we  go  to  the  palace  and  take  the  despot 
as  our  teacher  ?  Should  we  pay  much  heed  to  his 
assurance,  that  he  alone  could  understand  the 
character  of  absolute  power,  and  that  we  in  a 
republic  could  know  nothing  of  the  condition  of 
men  subjected  to  irresponsible  will  ?  The  sad 
influence  of  slavery,  in  darkening  the  mind  which 
is  perpetually  conversant  with  it,  is  disclosed  to 
us  in  the  recent  attempts  made  at  the  South  to 
represent  this  institution  as  a  good.  Freemen, 
who  would  sooner  die  than  resign  their  rights, 
talk  of  the  happiness  of  those  from  whom  every 
right  is  wrested.  They  talk  of  the  slave  as 
"  property,"  with  the  same  confidence  as  if  this 
were  the  holiest  claim.  This  is  one  of  the 
mournful  effects  of  slavery.  It  darkens  the  moral 
sense  of  the  master.  And  can  men,  whose  posi 
tion  is  so  unfavorable  to  just,  impartial  judgment, 
expect  us  to  acquiesce  in  their  views  ? 

There  is  another  reply.  If  the  slave-holding 
States  expect  us  to  admit  their  views  of  this  insti 
tution,  they  must  allow  it  to  be  freely  discussed 
among  themselves.  Of  what  avail  is  their  testi 
mony  in  favor  of  slavery,  when  not  a  tongue  is 
allowed  to  say  a  word  in  its  condemnation  ?  Of 
what  use  is  the  press,  when  it  can  publish  only  on 
one  side  ?  In  the  slave-holding  States  freedom  of 

O 

speech  is  at  an  end.  Whoever  should  express 
among  them  the  sentiments  respecting  slavery 


106 

which  are  universally  adopted  through  the  civil 
ized  world,  would  put  his  life  in  jeopardy,  would 
probably  be  flayed  or  hung.  On  this  great  sub 
ject,  which  affects  vitally  their  peace  and  pros 
perity,  their  moral  and  political  interests,  no  phi 
lanthropist,  who  has  come  to  the  truth,  can  speak 
his  mind.  Even  the  minister  of  religion,  who 
feels  the  hostility  between  slavery  and  Christianity, 
dares  not  speak.  His  calling  might  not  save  him 
from  popular  rage.  Thus  slavery  avenges  itself. 
It  brings  the  masters  under  despotism.  It  takes 
away  that  liberty  which  a  freeman  prizes  as  life, — 
liberty  of  speech.  All  this,  we  are  told,  is  neces 
sary,  and  so  it  may  be;  but  an  institution  imposing 
such  a  necessity  cannot  be  a  good  ;  and  one  thing 
is  plain;  the  testimony  of  men  placed  under  such 
restraints  cannot  be  too  cautiously  received.  We 
have  better  sources  of  knowledge.  We  have  the 
testimony  of  ages,  and  the  testimony  of  the  un 
changeable  principles  of  human  nature.  These 
assure  us  that  slavery  is  "  evil,  and  evil  continu 
ally." 

I  ought  not  to  close  this  head,  without  acknowl 
edging,  (what  I  cheerfully  do,)  that  in  many  cases 
the  kindness  of  masters  does  much  for  the  mitiga 
tion  of  slavery.  Could  it  be  rendered  harmless,  the 
efforts  of  many  would  not  be  spared  to  make  it  so. 
It  is  evil,  not  through  any  singular  corruption  in 
the  slaveholder,  but  from  its  own  nature,  and  in 


107 

spite  of  all  efforts  to  make  it  a  good.  It  is  evil, 
not  because  it  exists  on  this  or  that  spot.  Were  it 
planted  at  the  North,  it  would  become  a  greater 
curse,  more  hardening  and  depraving,  than  it  now 
proves  under  a  milder  sky.  It  is  not  of  the  par 
ticular  form  of  slavery  in  this  country  that  I 
complain.  I  am  willing  to  allow  that  it  is  here 
comparatively  mild  ;  that  on  many  plantations  no 
abuses  exist  but  such  as  are  inseparable  from  its 
very  nature.  The  mischief  lies  in  its  very  na 
ture.  "  Men  do  not  gather  grapes  of  thorns, 
or  figs  of  thistles."  An  institution  so  founded  in 
wrong,  so  imbued  with  injustice,  cannot  be  made  a 
good.  It  cannot  like  other  institutions  be  perpetu 
ated  by  being  improved.  To  improve  it,  is  to  pre 
pare  the  way  for  its  subversion.  Every  melioration 
of  the  slave's  lot  is  a  step  toward  freedom.  Slave 
ry  is  thus  radically,  essentially  evil.  Every  good 
man  should  earnestly  pray  and  use  every  virtuous 
influence,  that  an  institution  so  blighting  to  human 
nature  may  be  brought  to  an  end. 


CHAPTER    V. 


SCRIPTURE. 

ATTEMPTS  are  often  made  to  support  slavery  by 
the  authority  of  Revelation.  "  Slavery,"  it  is 
said,  "  is  allowed  in  the  Old  Testament,  and  not 
condemned  in  the  New.  Paul  commands  slaves 
to  obey.  He  commands  masters,  not  to  release 
their  slaves,  but  to  treat  them  justly.  Therefore 
slavery  is  right,  is  sanctified  by  God's  Word."  In 
this  age  of  the  world,  and  amidst  the  light  which 
has  been  thrown  on  the  true  interpretation  of  the 
Scriptures,  such  reasoning  hardly  deserves  notice. 
A  few  words  only  will  be  offered  in  reply. 

This  reasoning  proves  too  much.  If  usages 
sanctioned  in  the  Old  Testament  and  not  forbid 
den  in  the  New  are  right,  then  our  moral  code 
will  undergo  a  sad  deterioration.  Polygamy  was 
allowed  to  the  Israelites,  was  the  practice  of  the 
holiest  men,  and  was  common  and  licensed  in  the 
age  of  the  Apostles.  But  the  Apostles  no  where 
condemn  it,  nor  was  the  renunciation  of  it  made  an 
essential  condition  of  admission  into  the  Christian 


109 

church.  It  is  true  that  in  one  passage  Christ  has 
condemned  it  by  implication.  But  is  not  slavery 
condemned  by  stronger  implication  in  the  many 
passages,  which  make  the  new  religion  to  consist  in 
serving  one  another,  and  in  doing  to  others  what 
we  would  that  they  should  do  to  ourselves?  Why 
may  not  Scripture  be  used  to  stock  our  houses  with 
wives  as  well  as  with  slaves  ? 

Again.  Paul  is  said  to  sanction  slavery.  Let 
us  now  ask,  What  was  slavery  in  the  age  of  Paul  ? 
It  was  the  slavery,  not  so  much  of  black  as  of 
white  men,  not  merely  of  barbarians  but  of  Greeks, 
not  merely  of  the  ignorant  and  debased,  but  of 
the  virtuous,  educated,  and  refined.  Piracy 
and  conquest  were  the  chief  means  of  supplying 
the  slave-market,  and  they  heeded  neither  charac 
ter  nor  condition.  Sometimes  the  greater  part  of 
the  population  of  a  captured  city  was  sold  into 
bondage,  sometimes  the  whole,  as  in  the  case  of 
-Jerusalem.  Noble  and  royal  families,  the  rich  and 
great,  the  learned  and  powerful,  the  philosopher 
and  poet,  the  wisest  and  best  men,  were  condemned 
to  the  chain.  Such  was  ancient  slavery.  And  this 
we  are  told  is  allowed  and  confirmed  by  the  Word 
of  God  !  Had  Napoleon,  on  capturing  Berlin  or 
Vienna,  doomed  most  or  the  whole  of  their  inhab 
itants  to  bondage  ;  had  he  seized  on  venerable 
matrons,  the  mothers  of  illustrious  men,  who  were 
reposing  after  virtuous  lives  in  the  bosom  of  grate- 


110 

ful  families ;  had  he  seized  on  the  delicate,  refined, 
beautiful  young  woman,  whose  education  had  pre 
pared  her  to  grace  the  sphere  in  which  God  had 
placed  her,  whose  plighted  love  had  opened  before 
her  visions  of  bliss,  and  over  all  whose  prospects 
the  freshest  hopes  and  most  glowing  imaginations 
of  early  life  were  breathed ;  had  he  seized  on  the 
minister  of  religion,  the  man  of  science,  the  man  of 
genius,  the  sage,  the  guides  of  the  world  ;  had  he 
scattered  these  through  the  slave-markets  of  the 
world,  and  transferred  them  to  the  highest  bidders 
at  public  auction,  the  men  to  be  converted  into 
instruments  of  slavish  toil,  the  women  into  instru 
ments  of  lust,  and  both  to  endure  whatever  indig 
nities  and  tortures  absolute  power  can  inflict ;  we 
should  then  have  had  a  picture  in  the  present  age 
of  slavery  as  it  existed  in  the  time  of  Paul.  Such 
slavery  we  are  told  was  sanctioned  by  the  Apostle  ! 
Such  we  are  told  he  pronounced  to  be  morally 
right !  Had  Napoleon  sent  some  cargoes  of  these 
victims  to  these  shores,  we  might  have  bought 
them,  and  degraded  the  noblest  beings  to  our 
lowest  uses,  and  might  have  cited  Paul  to  testify  to 
our  innocence  !  Were  an  infidel  to  bring  this  charge 
against  the  Apostle,  we  should  say  that  he  was  labor 
ing  in  his  vocation ;  but  that  a  professed  Christian 
should  so  insult  this  sainted  philanthropist,  this 
martyr  to  truth  and  benevolence,  is  a  sad  proof  of 
the  power  of  slavery  to  blind  its  supporters  to  the 
plainest  truth. 


Ill 

Slavery,  in  the  age  of  the  Apostle,  had  so  pene 
trated  society,  was  so  intimately  interwoven  with  it, 
and  the  materials  of  servile  war  were  so  abundant, 
that  a  religion,  preaching  freedom  to  its  victims, 
would  have  shaken  the  social  fabric  to  its  founda 
tion,  and  would  have  armed  against  itself  the  whole 
power  of  the  State.  Of  consequence  Paul  did 
not  assail  it.  He  satisfied  himself  with  spreading 
principles,  which,  however  slowly,  could  not  but 
work  its  destruction.  He  commanded  Philemon 
to  receive  his  fugitive  slave,  Onesimus,  "  not  as  a 
slave,  but  above  a  slave,  as  a  brother  beloved  ; " 
and  he  commanded  masters  to  give  to  their  slaves 
that  which  was  "just  and  equal;"  thus  asserting 
for  the  slave  the  rights  of  a  Christian  and  a  Man ; 
and  how,  in  his  circumstances,  he  could  have  done 
more  for  the  subversion  of  slavery,  I  do  not  see. 

Let  me  offer  another  remark.  The  perversion 
of  Scripture  to  the  support  of  slavery  is  singularly 
inexcusable  in  this  country.  Paul  not  only  com 
manded  slaves  to  obey  their  masters.  He  deliver 
ed  these  precepts  :  "  Let  every  soul  be  subject  unto 
the  higher  powers.  For  there  is  no  power  but  of 
God;  the  powers  that  be  are  ordained  of  God. 
Whosoever,  therefore,  resisteth  the  power,  resisteth 
the  ordinance  of  God  ;  and  they  that  resist  shall 
receive  to  themselves  damnation."  This  pas 
sage  was  written  in  the  time  of  Nero.  It  teaches 
passive  obedience  to  despotism  more  strongly  than 


any  text  teaches  the  lawfulness  of  slavery.  Ac 
cordingly,  it  has  been  quoted  for  ages  by  the  sup 
porters  of  arbitrary  power,  and  made  the  strong 
hold  of  tyranny.  Did  our  fathers  acquiesce  in  the 
most  obvious  interpretation  of  this  text?  Because 
the  first  Christians  were  taught  to  obey  despotic 
rule,  did  our  fathers  feel  as  if  Christianity  had  stript 
men  of  their  rights  ?  Did  they  argue  that  tyranny 
was  to  be  excused,  because  forcible  opposition  to 
it  is  in  most  cases  wrong  ?  Did  they  argue  that 
absolute  power  ceases  to  be  unjust,  because,  as  a 
gene'ral  rule,  it  is  the  duty  of  subjects  to  obey  ? 
Did  they  infer  that  bad  institutions  ought  to  be 
perpetual,  because  the  subversion  of  them  by 
force  will  almost  always  inflict  greater  evil  than  it 
removes  ?  No  ;  they  were  wiser  interpreters  of 
God's  Word.  They  believed  that  despotism  was  a 
wrong,  notwithstanding  the  general  obligation  upon 
its  subjects  to  obey  ;  and  that  whenever  a  whole 
people  should  so  feel  the  wrong  as  to  demand  its 
removal,  the  time  for  removing  it  had  fully  come. 
Such  is  the  school  in  which  we  here  have  been 
brought  up.  To  us,  it  is  no  mean  proof  of  the 
divine  original  of  Christianity,  that  it  teaches  hu 
man  brotherhood  and  favors  human  rights;  and 
yet,  on  the  ground  of  two  or  three  passages,  which 
admit  different  constructions,  we  make  Christianity 
the  minister  of  slavery,  the  forger  of  chains  for 
those  whom  it  came  to  make  free. 


113 

It  is  a  plain  rule  of  scriptural  criticism,  that  par 
ticular  texts  should  be  interpreted  according  to  the 
general  tenor  and  spirit  of  Christianity.  And 
what  is  the  general,  the  perpetual  teaching  of 
Christianity  in  regard  to  social  duty  ?  "  All  things 
whatsoever  ye  would  that  men  should  do  to  you, 
do  ye  even  so  to  them ;  for  this  is  the  law 'and 
the  prophets."  Now  does  not  every  man  feel  that 
nothing,  nothing,  could  induce  him  to  consent  to  be 
a  slave  ?  Does  he  not  feel,  that,  if  reduced  to  this 
abject  lot,  his  whole  nature,  his  reason,  conscience, 
affections,  would  cry  out  against  it  as  the  greatest 
of  calamities  and  wrongs?  Can  he  pretend,  then, 
that  in  holding  others  in  bondage  he  does  to  his 
neighbour  what  he  would  that  his  neighbour  should 
do  to  him  ?  Of  what  avail  are  a  few  texts,  which 
were  designed  for  local  and  temporary  use,  when 
urged  against  the  vital,  essential  spirit,  and  the 
plainest  precepts  of  our  religion  ? 

I  close  this  section  with  a  few  extracts  from  a 
recent  work  of  one  of  our  most  distinguished  wri 
ters  ;  not  that  I  think  additional  arguments  neces 
sary,  but  because  the  authority  of  Scripture  is 
more  successfully  used  than  any  thing  else  to 
reconcile  good  minds  to  slavery. 

"  The  very  course,  which  the  Gospel  takes  on 
this  subject,  seems  to  have  been  the  only  one  that 
could  have  been  taken  in  order  to  effect  the  uni 
versal  abolition  of  slavery.  The  gospel  was  de- 
8 


114 

signed,  not  for  one  race  or  for  one  time,  but  for  all 
men  and  for  all  times.  It  looked  not  at  the  aboli 
tion  of  this  form  of  evil  for  that  age  alone,  but  for 
its  universal  abolition.  Hence  the  important  ob 
ject  of  its  author  was  to  gain  it  a  lodgment  in  every 
part  of  the  known  world ;  so  that,  by  its  universal 
diffusion  among  all  classes  of  society,  it  might 
quietly  and  peacefully  modify  and  subdue  the  evil 
passions  of  men ;  and  thus,  without  violence  work 
a  revolution  in  the  whole  mass  of  mankind.  In  this 
manner  alone  could  its  object,  a  universal  moral 
revolution,  have  been  accomplished.  For  if  it  had 
forbidden  the  evil  instead  of  subverting  the  prin 
ciple,  if  it  had  proclaimed  the  unlawfulness  of 
slavery,  and  taught  slaves  to  resist  the  oppression 
of  their  masters,  it  would  instantly  have  arrayed 
the  two  parties  in  deadly  hostility  throughout  the 
civilized  world  ;  its  announcement  would  have 
been  the  signal  of  servile  war;  and  the  very  name 
of  the  Christian  religion  would  have  been  forgotten 
amidst  the  agitations  of  universal  bloodshed.  The 
fact,  under  these  circumstances,  that  the  Gospel 
does  not  forbid  slavery,  affords  no  reason  to  sup 
pose  that  it  does  not  mean  to  prohibit  it ;  much 
less  does  it  afford  ground  for  belief  that  Jesus 
Christ  intended  to  authorize  it." 

"It  is  important  to  remember  that  two  grounds 
of  moral  obligation  are  distinctly  recognised  in  the 
Gospel.  The  first  is  our  duty  to  man  as  man ; 


115 


that  is,  on  the  ground  of  the  relation  which  men 
sustain  to  each  other;  the  second  is  our  duty  to 
man  as  a  creature  of  God  ;  that  is,  on  the  relation 
which  we  all  sustain  to  God.  —  Now,  it  is  to  be 
observed,  that  it  is  precisely  upon  this  latter  ground 
that  the  slave  is  commanded  to  obey  his  master. 
It  is  never  urged  like  the  duty  to  obedience  to 
parents,  because  it  is  right,  but  because  the  culti 
vation  of  meekness  and  forbearance  under  injury 
will  be  well  pleasing  unto  God.  —  The  manner  in 
which  the  duty  of  servants  or  slaves  is  inculcated, 
therefore,  affords  no  ground  for  the  assertion  that 
the  Gospel  authorizes  one  man  to  hold  another  in 
bondage,  any  more  than  the  command  to  honor 
the  king,  when  that  king  was  Nero,  authorized  the 
tyranny  of  the  emperor  ;  or  than  the  command  to 
turn  the  other  cheek,  when  one  is  smitten,  justifies 
the  infliction  of  violence  by  an  injurious  man."  * 

*  Wayland's  Elements  of  Moral  Science,  pages  225-6.  The 
discussion  of  Slavery,  in  the  chapter  from  which  these  extracts 
are  made,  is  well  worthy  attention. 


CHAPTER    VI. 


MEANS    OF    REMOVING    SLAVERY. 

How  slavery  shall  be  removed,  is  a  question  for 
the  slaveholder,  and  one  which  he  alone  can  fully 
answer.  He  alone  has  an  intimate  knowledge  of 
the  character  and  habits  of  the  slaves,  to  which  the 
moans  of  emancipation  should  be  carefully  adapted. 
General  views  and  principles  may  and  should  be 
suggested  at  a  distance ;  but  the  mode  of  applying 
them  can  be  understood  only  by  those  who  dwell 
on  the  spot  where  the  evil  exists.  To  the  slave 
holder  belongs  the  duty  of  settling  and  employing 
the  best  methods  of  liberation,  and  to  no  other. 
Wo  have  no  right  of  interference,  nor  do  we  desire 
it.  We  hold  that  the  dangers  of  emancipation,  if 
such  there  are,  would  be  indefinitely  increased, 
were  the  boon  to  come  to  the  slave  from  a  foreign 
hand,  were  he  to  see  it  forced  on  the  master  by  a 
foreign  power.  It  is  of  the  highest  importance,  that 
slavery  should  be  succeeded  by  a  friendly  relation 
between  master  and  slave ;  and  to  produce  this, 
the  latter  must  see  in  the  former  his  benefactor 
and  deliverer.  His  liberty  must  seem  to  him  an 


117 

expression  of  benevolence  and  regard  for  his  rights. 
He  must  put  confidence  in  his  superiors,  and  look 
to  them  cheerfully  and  gratefully  for  counsel  and 
aid.  Let  him  feel,  that  liberty  has  been  wrung 
from  an  unwilling  master,  who  would  willingly 
replace  the  chain,  and  jealousy,  vindictiveness,  and 
hatred  would  spring  up,  to  blight  the  innocence 
and  happiness  of  his  new  freedom,  and  to  make  it 
a  peril  to  himself  and  all  around  him.  I  believe, 
indeed,  that  emancipation,  though  so  bestowed, 
would  be  better  than  everlasting  bondage ;  but  the 
responsibility  of  so  conferring  it  is  one  that  none  of 
us  are  anxious  to  assume. 

We  cannot  but  fear  much  from  the  experiment 
now  in  progress  in  the  West  Indies,  on  account 
of  its  being  the  work  of  a  foreign  hand.  The 
planters,  especially  of  Jamaica,  have  opposed  the 
mother-country  with  a  pertinaciousness  border 
ing  on  insanity ;  have  done  much  to  exasperate 
the  slaves,  whose  freedom  they  could  not  pre 
vent  ;  have  done  nothing  to  prepare  them  for  lib 
erty  ;  have  met  them  with  gloom  on  their  counte 
nances,  and  with  evil  auguries  on  their  lips ;  have 
taught  them  to  look  abroad  for  relief,  and  to  see  in 
their  masters  only  obstructions  to  the  amelioration 
of  their  lot.  It  is  possible  that  under  all  these  ob 
stacles  emancipation  may  succeed.  God  grant  it 
success  !  If  it  fail,  the  planter  will  have  brought 
the  ruin  very  much  on  himself.  Policy,  as  well  as 


118 

duty,  so  plainly  taught  him  to  take  into  his  own 
hands  the  work  which  a  superior  power  had  begun, 
to  spare  no  effort,  no  expense,  for  binding  to  him 
by  new  ties  those  who  were  to  throw  off  their  for 
mer  chains,  that  we  know  not  how  to  account  for 
his  conduct,  but  by  supposing  that  his  unhappy 
position  as  a  slaveholder  had  robbed  him  of  his 
reason,  as  well  as  blunted  his  moral  sense. 

In  this  country  no  power  but  that  of  the  slave- 
holding  States  can  remove  the  evil,  and  none  of  us  are 
anxious  to  take  the  office  from  their  hands.  They 
alone  can  do  it  safely.  They  alone  can  determine 
and  apply  the  true  and  sure  means  of  emanci 
pation.  That  such  means  exist  I  cannot  doubt ; 
for  emancipation  has  already  been  carried  through 
successfully  in  other  countries ;  and  even  were 
there  no  precedent,  I  should  be  sure,  that,  under 
God's  benevolent  and  righteous  government,  there 
could  not  be  a  necessity  for  holding  human  beings 
in  perpetual  bondage.  This  faith,  however,  is  not 
universal.  Many,  when  they  hear  of  the  evils  of 
slavery,  say,  "  It  is  bad,  but  remediless.  There 
are  no  means  of  relief."  They  say,  in  a  despairing 
tone,  "  Give  us  your  plan  ;  "  and  justify  their  indif 
ference  to  emancipation,  by  what  they  call  its 
hopelessness.  This  state  of  mind  has  induced  me 
to  offer  a  few  remarks  on  the  means  of  removing 
slavery  ;  not  that  I  suppose,  that  an  individual  so 
distant  can  do  the  work  to  which  the  whole  Intel- 


119 

lect  and  benevolence  of  the  South  should  be  sum 
moned,  but  that  I  may  suggest  a  few  principles, 
which  I  think  would  insure  a  happy  result  to  the 
benevolent  enterprise,  and  that  I  may  remove  the 
incredulity  of  which  1  have  complained. 

What,  then,  is  to  be  done  for  the  removal  of 
slavery  ?  In  the  first  place,  the  slaveholders  should 
solemnly  disclaim  the  right  of  property  in  human 
beings.  The  great  principle,  that  man  cannot  be 
long  to  man,  should  be  distinctly,  solemnly  recog 
nised.  The  slave  should  be  acknowledged  as  a 
partaker  of  a  common  nature,  as  having  the  essen 
tial  rights  of  humanity.  This  great  truth  lies  at  the 
foundation  of  every  wise  plan  for  his  relief.  The 
cordial  admission  of  it  would  give  a  consciousness  of 
dignity,  of  grandeur,  to  efforts  for  emancipation. 
There  is,  indeed,  a  grandeur  in  the  idea  of  raising 
more  than  two  millions  of  human  beings  to  the 

O 

enjoyment  of  human  rights,  to  the  blessings  of 
Christian  civilization,  to  the  means  of  indefinite  im 
provement.  The  slaveholding  States  are  called  to 
a  nobler  work  of  benevolence  than  is  committed  to 
any  other  communities.  They  should  comprehend 
its  dignity.  This  they  cannot  do,  till  the  slave  is 
truly,  sincerely,  with  the  mind  and  heart,  recog 
nised  as  a  Man,  till  he  ceases  to  be  regarded  as 
Property. 

It  may  be  asked,  whether,  in  calling  the  slave- 
holding  States  to  abolish   property  in  the  slave,  I 


120 

ntend  that  he  should  be  immediately  set  free  from 
all  his  present  restraints.  By  no  means.  Nothing 
is  farther  from  my  thoughts.  The  slave  cannot 
rightfully  and  should  not  be  owned  by  the  Indi 
vidual.  But,  like  every  other  citizen,  he  belongs 
to  the  Community,  he  is  subject  to  the  community, 
and  the  community  has  a  right  and  is  bound  to 
continue  all  such  restraints,  as  its  own  safety  and 
the  well-being  of  the  slave  demand.  It  would 
be  cruelty,  not  kindness,  to  the  latter  to  give  him  a 
freedom,  which  he  is  unprepared  to  understand  or 
enjoy.  It  would  be  cruelty  to  strike  the  fetters 
from  a  man,  whose  first  steps  would  infallibly  lead 
him  to  a  precipice.  The  slave  should  not  have  an 
owner,  but  he  should  have  a  guardian.  He  needs 
authority,  to  supply  the  lack  of  that  discretion 
which  he  has  not  yet  attained  ;  but  it  should  be  the 
authority  of  a  friend  ;  an  official  authority,  confer 
red  by  the  state,  and  for  which  there  should  be 
responsibleness  to  the  state,  an  authority  especially 
designed  to  prepare  its  subjects  for  personal  free 
dom.  The  slave  should  not,  in  the  first  instance, 
be  allowed  to  wander  at  his  will  beyond  the  plan 
tation  on  which  he  toils;  and  if  he  cannot  be 
induced  to  work  by  rational  and  natural  motives,  he 
should  be  obliged  to  labor  ;  on  the  same  principles 
on  which  the  vagrant  in  other  communities  is 
confined  and  compelled  to  earn  his  bread.  The 
gift  of  liberty  would  be  a  mere  name,  and 


121 

worse  than  nominal,  were  he  to  be  let  loose  on 
society  under  circumstances  driving  him  to  crimes, 
for  which  he  would  be  condemned  to  severer 
bondage  than  he  had  escaped.  Many  restraints 
must  be  continued  ;  but  continued,  not  because  the 
colored  race  are  property,  not  because  they  are 
bound  to  live  and  toil  for  an  owner,  but  solely 
and  wholly  because  their  own  innocence,  security, 
and  education,  and  the  public  order  and  peace, 
require  them,  during  the  present  incapacity,  to  be 
restrained.  It  should  be  remembered,  that  this 
incapacity  is  not  their  fault,  but  their  misfortune ; 
that  not  they,  but  the  community,  are  responsible 
for  it ;  and  that  the  community  cannot  without 
crime  profit  by  its  own  wrong.  If  the  government 
should  make  any  distinctions  among  the  citizens, 
it  should  be  in  behalf  of  the  injured.  Instead  of 
urging  the  past  existence  of  slavery,  and  the  inca 
pacity  which  it  has  induced,  as  apologies  or  reasons 
for  continuing  the  yoke,  the  community  should 
find  in  these  very  circumstances  new  obligations  to 
effort  for  the  wronged. 

There  is  but  one  weighty  argument  against  im 
mediate  emancipation,  namely,  that  the  slave 
would  not  support  himself  and  his  children  by 
honest  industry ;  that,  having  always  worked  on 
compulsion,  he  will  not  work  without  it ;  that, 
having  always  labored  from  another's  will,  he  wil] 
not  labor  from  his  own  ;  that  there  is  no  spring  of 


122 


exertion  in  his  own  mind ;  that  he  is  unused  to 
forethought,  providence,  and  self-denial,  and  the 
responsibilities  of  domestic  life ;  that  freedom 
would  produce  idleness ;  idleness,  want ;  want, 
crime  ;  and  that  crime,  when  it  should  become  the 
habit  of  numbers,  would  bring  misery,  perhaps 
ruin,  not  only  on  the  offenders,  but  the  state. 
Here  lies  the  strength  of  the  argument  for  contin 
uing  present  restraint.  Give  the  slaves  disposi 
tion  and  power  to  support  themselves  and  their 
families  by  honest  industry,  and  complete  emanci 
pation  should  not  be  delayed  one  hour. 

The  great  step,  then,  towards  the  removal  of 
slavery  is  to  prepare  the  slaves  for  self-support. 
And  this  work  seems  attended  with  no  peculiar 
difficulty.  The  colored  man  is  not  a  savage,  to 
whom  toil  is  torture,  who  has  centred  every  idea 
of  happiness  and  dignity  in  a  wild  freedom,  who 
must  exchange  the  boundless  forest  for  a  narrow 
plantation,  and  bend  his  proud  neck  to  an  unknown 
yoke.  Labor  was  his  first  lesson,  arid  he  has  been 
repeating  it  all  his  life,  Can  it  be  a  hard  task  to 
teach  him  to  labor  for  himself,  to  work  from  im 
pulses  in  his  own  breast  ? 

Much  may  be  done  at  once  to  throw  the  slave 
on  himself,  to  accustom  him  to  work  for  his  own 
and  his  family's  support,  to  awaken  forethought, 
and  strengthen  the  habit  of  providing  for  the 
future.  On  every  plantation  there  are  slaves,  who 


123 

would  do  more  for  wages  than  from  fear  of  pun 
ishment.  There  are  those,  who,  if  entrusted  with 
a  piece  of  ground,  would  support  themselves  and 
pay  a  rent  in  kind.  There  are  those,  who,  if  mod 
erate  task-work  were  given  them,  would  gain  their 
whole  subsistence  in  their  own  time.  Now  every 
such  man  ought  to  be  committed  very  much  to 
himself.  It  is  a  crime  to  subject  to  the  whip  a 
man  who  can  be  made  to  toil  from  rational  and 
honorable  motives.  This  partial  introduction  of 
freedom  would  form  a  superior  class  arLong  the 
slaves,  whose  example  would  have  immense  moral 
power  on  those  who  needed  compulsion.  The 
industrious  and  thriving  would  give  an  impulse 
to  the  whole  race.  It  is  important  that  the 
property,  thus  earned  by  the  slave,  should  be 
made  as  sacred  as  that  of  any  other  member  of 
the  community,  and  for  this  end  he  should  be 
enabled  to  obtain  redress  of  wrongs.  In  case  of 
being  injured  by  his  master  in  this  or  in  any 
respect,  he  should  either  be  set  free,  or,  if  unpre 
pared  for  liberty,  should  be  transferred  to  another 
guardian. 

As  another  means  of  raising  the  slave  and  fitting 
him  to  act  from  higher  motives  than  compulsion, 
a  system  of  bounties  and  rewards  should  be  intro 
duced.  Ne\v  privileges,  increased  indulgences, 
honorable  distinctions,  expressions  of  respect, 
should  be  awarded  to  the  honest  and  industrious. 


124 


No  people  are  more  alive  to  commendation  and 
honorable  distinction  than  the  colored  race. 
Prizes  for  good  conduct,  adapted  to  their  tastes 
and  character,  might  in  a  good  degree  supersede 
the  lash.  Their  love  of  ornament  might  be  turned 
to  a  good  account.  The  object  is  to  bring  the 
slave  to  labor  from  other  motives  than  brutal 
compulsion.  Such  motives  may  easily  be  found, 
if  the  end  be  conscientiously  proposed. 

One  of  the  great  means  of  elevating  the  slave, 
and  calling  forth  his  energies,  is  to  place  his  do 
mestic  relations  on  new  ground.  This  is  essential. 
We  wish  him  to  labor  for  his  family.  Then  he 
must  have  a  family  to  labor  for.  Then  his  wife 
and  children  must  be  truly  his  own.  Then  his 
home  must  be  inviolate.  Then  the  responsibili 
ties  of  a  husband  and  father  must  be  laid  on  him. 
It  is  agreed  that  he  will  be  fit  for  freedom,  as  soon 
as  the  support  of  his  family  shall  become  his  habit 
and  his  happiness  ;  and  how  can  he  be  brought  to 
this  condition,  as  long  as  he  shall  see  no  sanctity  in 
the  marriage-bond,  as  long  as  he  shall  see  his 
wife  and  his  children  exposed  to  indignity  and  to 
sale,  as  long  as  their  support  shall  not  be  entrusted 
to  his  care  ?  No  measure  for  preparing  the  slave 
for  liberty  can  be  so  effectual  as  the  improvement 
of  his  domestic  lot.  The  whole  power  of  religion 
should  be  employed  to  impress  him  with  the 
sacredness  and  duties  of  marriage.  The  chaste 


125 

and  the  faithful  in  this  connexion  should  receive 
open  and  strong  marks  of  respect.  They  should 
be  treated  as  at  the  head  of  their  race.  The 
husband  and  wife,  who  prove  false  to  each  other, 
and  who  will  not  labor  for  their  children,  should 
be  visited  with  the  severest  rebuke.  To  create  a 
sense  of  domestic  obligation,  to  awaken  domestic  af 
fections,  to  give  the  means  of  domestic  happiness,  to 
fix  deeply  a  conviction  of  the  indissolubleness  of  mar 
riage,  and  of  the  solemnity  of  the  parental  relation, 
these  are  the  essential  means  of  raising  the  slave 
to  a  virtuous  and  happy  freedom.  All  other  men 
labor  for  their  families  ;  and  so  will  the  slave,  if 
the  sentiments  of  a  man  be  cherished  in  his  breast. 
We  keep  him  in  bondage,  because,  if  free,  he 
will  leave  his  wife  and  children  to  want ;  and  this 
bondage  break  down  all  the  feelings  and  habits 
which  would  incite  him  to  toil  for  their  support. 
Not  a  step  will  be  taken  towards  the  preparation 
of  the  slave  for  voluntary  labor,  till  his  domestic 
rights  be  respected.  The  violation  of  these  cries 
to  God,  more  than  any  other  evil  of  his  lot. 

To  carry  this  and  all  other  means  of  improve 
ment  into  effect,  it  is  essential  that  the  slave 
should  no  longer  be  bought  and  sold.  As  long  as 
he  is  made  an  article  of  merchandise,  he  cannot 
be  fitted  for  the  offices  of  a  man.  He  will  have 
little  motive  to  accumulate  comforts  and  ornaments 
in  his  hut,  if  at  any  moment  he  may  be  torn  from 


126 


it.  While  treated  as  property,  he  will  have  little 
encouragement  to  accumulate  property,  for  it  can 
not  be  secure.  While  his  wife  and  children  may 
be  exposed  at  auction,  and  carried,  he  knows  not 
where,  can  he  be  expected  to  feel  and  act  as  a 
husband  and  father  ?  It  is  time,  that  this  Christian 
and  civilized  country  should  no  longer  be  dishon 
ored  by  one  of  the  worst  usages  of  barbarism. 
Break  up  the  slave-market,  and  one  of  the  chief 
obstructions  to  emancipation  will  be  removed. 

Let  me  only  add,  that  religious  instruction 
should  go  hand  in  hand  wilh  all  other  means  for 
preparing  the  slave  for  freedom.  The  colored 
race  are  said  to  be  peculiarly  susceptible  of  the 
religious  sentiment.  If  this  be  addressed  wisely 
and  powerfully,  if  the  slave  be  brought  to  feel  his 
relation  and  accountableness  to  God,  and  to  com 
prehend  the  spirit  of  Christianity,  he  is  fit  for 
freedom.  To  accomplish  this  work,  perhaps 
preaching  should  not  be  the  only  or  chief  in 
strument.  Were  the  whole  colored  population 
to  be  assembled  into  Sunday-schools,  and  were 
the  whites  to  become  their  teachers,  a  new  and 
interesting  relation  would  be  formed  between  the 
races,  and  an  influence  be  exerted  which  would 
do  much  to  insure  safety  to  the  gift  of  freedom. 

In  these  remarks  I  have  not  intended  to  say 
that  emancipation  is  an  easy  work,  the  work  of 
a  day,  a  good  to  be  accomplished  without  sacrifices 


127 

and  toil.     The  colored  man  is,  indeed,  singularly 
susceptible    of  improvement,    in    consequence  of 
the   strength  of  his  propensities  to  imitation  and 
sympathy.     But  all  great  changes  in  society  have 
their  difficulties  and   inconveniences,  and   demand 
patient  labor,    I  ask  for  no  precipitate  measures,  no 
violent  changes.     I  ask  only  that  the  slaveholding 
States   would  resolve  conscientiously  and  in  good 
faith    to  remove  this  greatest  of  moral  evils  and 
wrongs,  and  would  bring  immediately  to  the  work  all 
their  intelligence,  virtue,  and  power,     That  its  diffi 
culties  would  yield  before  such  energies,  who  can 
doubt?      Our  weakness  for  holy  enterprises  lies 
generally  in  our  own  reluctant  wills.     Breathe  into 
men  a  fervent  purpose,  and  you  awaken  powers 
before  unknown.     How  soon  would  slavery  disap 
pear,  were  the  obligation  to  remove  it  thoroughly 
understood  and  deeply  felt !     We  are  told  that  the 
slaveholding  States  have  recently    prospered  be 
yond    all    precedent.       This    accession    to   their 
wealth  should  be  consecrated  to  the  work  of  liber 
ating  their  fellow-creatures.     Not  one  indulgence 
should  be  added  to  their  modes  of  life,  until  the  cry 
of  the   oppressed    has  ceased    from    their   fields, 
until  the  rights  of  every  human  being  are  restored. 
Government  should  devote  itself  to  this  as  its  great 
object.      Legislatures   should    meet   to   free    the 
slave.     The  church  should  rest  not,  day  or  night, 
till   this  stain  be   wiped  away.      Let  the    delib- 


128 

eration  of  the  wise,  the  energies  of  the  active, 
the  wealth  of  the  prosperous,  the  prayers  and 
toils  of  the  good,  have  Emancipation  for  their 
great  end.  Let  this  be  discussed  habitually  in 
the  family  circle,  in  the  conference  of  Christians, 
in  the  halls  of  legislation.  Let  it  mingle  with 
the  first  thoughts  of  the  slaveholder  in  the  morning 
and  the  last  at  night.  Who  can  doubt  that  to 
such  a  spirit  God  would  reveal  the  means  of  wise 
and  powerful  action  ?  There  is  but  one  obstacle 
to  emancipation,  and  that  is,  the  want  of  that 
spirit  in  which  Christians  and  freemen  should 
resolve  to  exterminate  slavery. 

I  have  said  nothing  of  colonization  among  the 
means  of  removing  slavery,  because  I  believe  that 
to  rely  on  it  for  this  object  would  be  equivalent  to 
a  resolution  to  perpetuate  the  evil  without  end. 
Whatever  good  it  may  do  abroad,  and  I  trust  it 
will  do  much,  it  promises  little  at  home.  If  the 
slaveholding  States,  however,  should  engage  in 
colonization,  with  a  firm  faith  in  its  practicableness, 
with  an  energy  proportionate  to  its  greatness,  and 
with  a  sincere  regard  to  the  welfare  of  the  colored 
race,  I  am  confident  it  will  not  fail  from  want  of 
sympathy  and  aid  on  the  part  of  the  other  States. 
In  truth,  these  States  will  not  withhold  their  hearts 
or  hands  from  any  well  considered  plan  for  the 
removal  of  slavery. 


129 

I  have  said  nothing  of  the  inconveniences  and 
sufferings,  which,  it  is  urged,  will  follow  emanci 
pation,  be  it  ever  so  safe  ;  for  these,  if  real,  weigh 
nothing  against  the  claims  of  justice.  The  most 
common  objection  is,  that  a  mixture  of  the  two 
races  will  be  the  result.  Can  this  objection  be 
urged  in  good  faith?  Can  this  mixture  go  on 
faster  or  more  criminally  than  at  the  present 
moment  ?  Can  the  slaveholder  use  the  word 
"  amalgamation "  without  a  blush  ?  Nothing, 
nothing,  can  arrest  this  evil  but  the  raising  of  the 
colored  woman  to  a  new  sense  of  character,  to  a 
new  self-respect;  and  this  she  cannot  gain  but  by 
being  made  free.  That  emancipation  will  have 
its  evils  we  know ;  for  all  great  changes,  however 
beneficial,  in  the  social  condition  of  a  people,  must 
interfere  with  some  interests,  must  bring  loss  or 
hardship  to  one  class  or  another  ;  but  the  evils  of 
slavery  exceed  beyond  measure  the  greatest 
which  can  attend  its  removal.  Let  the  slave 
holder  desire  earnestly,  and  in  the  spirit  of  self- 
sacrifice,  to  restore  freedom,  to  secure  the  rights 
and  the  happiness  of  the  slave,  and  a  new  light  will 
break  upon  his  path.  "  Every  mountain  of  diffi 
culty  will  be  brought  low,  and  the  rough  places 
be  made  smooth  ; "  the  means  of  duty  will  become 
clear.  But  without  this  spirit,  no  eloquence  of 
man  or  angel  can  persuade  the  slaveholder  of  the 
safety  of  emancipation. 
9 


C  H  AFTER    VII. 


ABOLITIONISM. 

THE  word  ABOLITIONIST  in  its  true  meaning 
comprehends  every  man  who  feels  himself  bound  to 
exert  his  influence  for  removing  slavery.  It  is  a 
name  of  honorable  import,  and  was  worn,  not 
long  ago,  by  such  men  as  Franklin  and  Jay. 
Events,  however,  continually  modify  terms ;  and, 
of  late,  the  word  ABOLITIONIST  has  been  narrowed 
from  its  original  import,  and  restricted  to  the 
members  of  associations  formed  among  us  to  pro 
mote  Immediate  Emancipation.  It  is  not  without 
reluctance  that  I  give  up  to  a  small  body  a  name 
which  every  good  man  ought  to  bear.  But  to 
make  myself  intelligible  and  to  avoid  circumlo 
cution,  I  shall  use  the  word  in  what  is  now  its 
common  acceptation. 

I  approach  this  subject  unwillingly,  because  it 
will  be  my  duty  to  censure  those  whom  at  this 
moment  I  would  on  no  account  hold  up  to  public 
displeasure.  The  persecutions,  which  the  aboli 
tionists  have  suffered  and  still  suffer,  awaken  only 


131 

my  grief  and  indignation,  and  incline  me  to  defend 
them  to  the  full  extent  which  truth  and  justice  will 
admit.  To  the  persecuted  of  whatever  name  my 
sympathies  are  pledged,  and  especially  to  those 
who  are  persecuted  in  a  cause  substantially  good. 
I  would  not  for  worlds  utter  a  word  to  justify  the 
violence  recently  offered  to  a  party,  composed 
very  much  of  men  blameless  in  life,  and  holding 
the  doctrine  of  nonresistance  to  injuries  ;  and  of 
women,  exemplary  in  their  various  relations,  and 
acting,  however  mistakenly,  from  benevolent  and 
pious  impulses. 

Of  the  abolitionists  I  know  very  few  ;  but  I 
am  bound  to  say  of  these,  that  I  honor  them 
for  their  strength  of  principle,  their  sympathy 
with  their  fellow-creatures,  and  their  active  good 
ness.  As  a  party,  they  are  singularly  free  from 
political  and  religious  sectarianism,  and  have  been 
distinguished  by  the  absence  of  management,  cal 
culation,  and  worldly  wisdom.  That  they  have 
ever  proposed  or  desired  insurrection  or  violence 
among  the  slaves  there  is  no  reason  to  believe. 
All  their  principles  repel  the  supposition.  It  is 
a  remarkable  fact,  that,  though  the  South  and  the 
North  have  been  leagued  to  crush  them,  though 
they  have  been  watched  by  a  million  of  eyes,  and 
though  prejudice  has  been  prepared  to  detect  the 
slightest  sign  of  corrupt  communication  with  the 
slave,  yet  this  crime  has  not  been  fastened  on  a 


132 

single  member  of  this  body.     A  few  individuals 
at    the     South   have,   indeed,    been  tortured    or 
murdered  by  enraged  multitudes,  on  the  charge  of 
stirring  up  revolt ;  but  their  guilt  and  their  connex 
ion   with  the  abolitionists  were  not,  and  from  the 
circumstances  and  the  nature  of  the  case  could  not 
be,  established  by  those  deliberate  and  regular  modes 
of  investigation,  which  are  necessary  to  an  impar 
tial  judgment.     Crimes,  detected  and  hastily  pun 
ished  by  the  multitude  in  a  moment  of  feverish 
suspicion  and  wild  alarm,  are  generally  creatures  of 
fear  and  passion.    The  act  which  caused  the  present 
explosion  of  popular  feeling  was  the   sending  of 
pamphlets  by  the  Abolitionists  into  the  slave-hold 
ing   States.      In    so   doing,   they   acted   weakly 
and  without  decorum ;  but  they  must  have  been 
insane,  had  they  intended  to  stir  up  a  servile  war ; 
for  the  pamphlets  were  sent,  not  by  stealth,  but 
by  the  public  mail ;  and   not  to  the  slaves,  but 
to  the  masters ;  to  men  in  public  life,  to'  men  of 
the  greatest  influence  and  distinction.     Strange  in 
cendiaries  these  !    They  flourished  their  firebrands 
about  at  noon-day  ;  and,  still  more,  put  them  into 
the  hands  of  the  very  men  whom  it  is  said  they 
wished  to   destroy.     They  are   accused,  indeed, 
of  having  sent  some  of  the  pamphlets  to  the  free 
colored  people,  and  if  so,  they  acted  with  great 
and  culpable  rashness.     But  the  publicity  of  the 
whole  transaction  absolves  them  of  corrupt  design. 


133 

The  charge  of  corrupt  design,  so  vehemently 
brought  against  the  abolitionists,  is  groundless. 
The  charge  of  fanaticism  I  have  no  desire  to  repel. 
But  in  the  present  age  it  will  not  do  to  deal 
harshly  with  the  characters  of  fanatics.  They 
form  the  mass  of  the  people.  Religion  and  Poli 
tics,  Philanthropy  and  Temperance,  Nullification 
and  Antimasonry,  the  Levelling  Spirit  of  the 
working  man,  and  the  Speculating  Spirit  of  the 
man  of  business,  all  run  into  fanaticism.  This  is 
the  type  of  all  our  epidemics.  A  sober  man  who 
can  find  ?  The  abolitionists  have  but  caught  the 
fever  of  the  day.  That  they  should  have  escaped 
it  would  have  been  a  moral  miracle. — I  offer 
these  remarks  simply  from  a  sense  of  justice. 
Had  not  a  persecution,  without  parallel  in  our 
country,  broken  forth  against  this  society,  I  should 
not  have  spoken  a  word  in  their  defence.  But 
whilst  I  have  power  I  owe  it  to  the  Persecuted. 
If  they  have  laid  themselves  open  to  the  laws,  let 
them  suffer.  For  all  their  errors  and  sins  let 
the  tribunal  of  public  opinion  inflict  the  full 
measure  of  rebuke  which  they  deserve.  I  ask  no 
favor  for  them.  But  they  shall  not  be  stripped 
of  the  rights  of  man,  of  rights  guarantied  by  the 
laws  and  Constitution,  without  one  voice,  at  least, 
being  raised  in  their  defence. 

The  abolitionists  have  done  wrong,  I  believe  ; 
nor  is  their  wrong  to  be  winked  at,  because  done 


134 

fanatically  or  with  good  intention  ;  for  how  much 
mischief  may  be'  wrought  with  good  design  ! 
They  have  fallen  into  the  common  error  of  enthu 
siasts,  that  of  exaggerating  their  object,  of  feeling 
as  if  no  evil  existed  but  that  which  they  opposed, 
and  as  if  no  guilt  could  be  compared  with  that  of 
countenancing  or  upholding  it.  The  tone  of  their 
newspapers,  as  far  as  I  have  seen  them,  has  often 
been  fierce,  bitter,  and  abusive.  Their  imagina 
tions  have  fed  on  pictures  of  the  cruelty  to  which 
the  slave  is  exposed,  till  they  have  seemed  to 
think  that  his  abode  was  perpetually  resounding 
with  the  lash,  and  ringing  with  shrieks  of  agony; 
and  accordingly,  the  slaveholder  has  been  held  up 
to  execration,  as  a  monster  of  cruelty.  I  know 
that  many  of  their  publications  have  been  calm, 
well  considered,  and  abounding  in  strong  reason 
ing.  But  those,  which  have  been  most  widely 
scattered  and  are  most  adapted  to  act  on  the 
common  mind,  have  had  a  tone  unfriendly  both  to 
manners  and  to  the  spirit  of  our  religion.  I  doubt 
not  that  the  majority  of  the  abolitionists  condemn 
the  coarseness  and  violence  of  which  I  complain. 
But  in  this,  as  in  most  associations,  the  many  are 
represented  and  controlled  by  the  few,  and  are 
made  to  sanction  and  become  responsible  for  what 
they  disapprove. 

One  of  their  errors  has  been  the  adoption  of 
'•  Immediate  Emancipation  "  as  their  motto.     To 


135 

this  they  owe  not  a  little,  of  their  unpopularity. 
This  phrase  has  contributed  much  to  spread  far 
and  wide  the  belief,  that  they  wished  immediately 
to  free  the  slave  from  all  his  restraints.  They 
made  explanations ;  but  thousands  heard  the 
motto  who  never  saw  the  explanation  ;  and  it  is 
certainly  unwise  for  a  party  to  choose  a  watch 
word,  which  can  be  rescued  from  misapprehension 
only  by  labored  explication.  It  may  also  be 
doubted,  whether  they  ever  removed  the  objection 
which  their  language  so  universally  raised,  whether 
they  have  not  always  recommended  a  precipitate 
action,  inconsistent  with  the  well-being  of  the 
slave  and  the  order  of  the  state. 

Another  objection  to  their  movements  is,  that 
they  have  sought  to  accomplish  their  objects  by  a 
system  of  Agitation  ;  that  is,  by  a  system  of  affil 
iated  societies,  gathered,  and  held  together,  and 
extended,  by  passionate  eloquence.  This,  in 
truth,  is  the  common  mode  by  which  all  projects 
are  now  accomplished.  The  age  of  individual 
action  is  gone.  Truth  cannot  be  heard  unless 
shouted  by  a  crowd.  The  weightiest  argument 
for  a  doctrine  is  the  number  which  adopts  it. 
Accordingly,  to  gather  and  organize  multitudes  is 
the  first  care  of  him  who  would  remove  an  abuse 
or  spread  a  reform.  That  the  expedient  is  in 
some  cases  useful  is  not  denied.  But  generally 
it  is  a  showy,  noisy  mode  of  action,  appealing  to 


136 

the  passions,  and  driving  men  into  exaggeration ; 
and  there  are  special  reasons  why  such  a  mode 
should  not  be  employed  in  regard  to  slavery ; 
for  slavery  is  so  to  be  opposed  as  not  to  exaspe 
rate  the  slave,  or  endanger  the  community  in 
which  he  lives.  The  abolitionists  might  have 
formed  an  association  ;  but  it  should  have  been  an 
elective  one.  Men  of  strong  principles,  judicious 
ness,  sobriety,  should  have  been  carefully  sought 
as  members.  Much  good  might  have  been  accom 
plished  by  the  cooperation  of  such  philanthropists. 
Instead  of  this,  the  abolitionists  sent  forth  their 
orators,  some  of  them  transported  with  fiery  zeal, 
to  sound  the  alarm  against  slavery  through  the 
land,  to  gather  together  young  and  old,  pupils 
from  schools,  females  hardly  arrived  at  years  of 
discretion,  the  ignorant,  the  excitable,  the  impet 
uous,  and  to  organize  these  into  associations  for 
the  battle  against  oppression.  Very  unhappily 
they  preached  their  doctrine  to  the  colored  people, 
and  collected  these  into  their  societies.  To  this 
mixed  and  excitable  multitude,  minute,  heart 
rending  descriptions  of  slavery  were  given  in  the 
piercing  tones  of  passion  ;  and  slaveholders  were 
held  up  as  monsters  of  cruelty  and  crime.  Now 
to  this  procedure  I  must  object  as  unwise,  as 
unfriendly  to  the  spirit  of  Christianity,  and  as  in 
creasing,  in  a  degree,  the  perils  of  the  slaveholding 
States.  Among  the  unenlightened,  whom  they  so 


137 

powerfully  addressed,  was  there  not  reason  to 
fear  that  some  might  feel  themselves  called  to  sub 
vert  this  system  of  wrong,  by  whatever  means? 
From  the  free  colored  people  this  danger  was 
particularly  to  be  apprehended.  It  is  easy  for  us 
to  place  ourselves  in  their  situation.  Suppose 
that  millions  of  white  men  were  enslaved,  robbed 
of  all  their  rights,  in  a  neighbouring  country,  and 
enslaved  by  a  black  race,  who  had  torn  their  an 
cestors  from  the  shores  on  which  our  fathers  had 
lived.  How  deeply  should  we  feel  their  wrongs  ! 
And  would  it  be  wonderful,  if,  in  a  moment  of  pas 
sionate  excitement,  some  enthusiast  should  think  it 
his  duty  to  use  his  communication  with  his  injured 
brethren  for  stirring  them  up  to  revolt  ? 

Such  is  the  danger  from  abolitionism  to  the  slave- 
holding  States.  I  know  no  other.  It  is  but  jus 
tice  to  add,  that  the  principle  of  nonresistance, 
which  the  abolitionists  have  connected  with  their 
passionate  appeals,  seems  to  have  counteracted  the 
peril.  I  know  not  a  case  in  which  a  member  of 
an  anti-slavery  society  has  been  proved  by  legal 
investigation  to  have  tampered  with  the  slaves; 
and  after  the  strongly  pronounced  and  unanimous 
opinion  of  the  free  States  on  the  subject,  this  dan 
ger  may  be  considered  as  having  passed  away.  Still 
a  mode  of  action,  requiring  these  checks,  is  open  to 
strong  objections,  and  ought  to  be  abandoned. 
Happy  will  it  be,  if  the  disapprobation  of  friends,  as 


138 

well  as  of  foes,  should  give  to  abolitionists  a  caution 
and  moderation,  which  would  secure  the  acquies 
cence  of  the  judicious,  and  the  sympathies  of  the 
friends  of  mankind  !  Let  not  a  good  cause  find  its 
chief  obstruction  in  its  defenders.  Let  the  truth, 
and  the  whole  truth,  be  spoken  without  paltering  or 
fear ;  but  so  spoken  as  to  convince,  not  inflame,  as 
to  give  no  alarm  to  the  wise,  and  no  needless 
exasperation  to  the  selfish  and  passionate. 

I  know  it  is  said,  that  nothing  can  be  done  but 
by  excitement  and  vehemence ;  that  the  zeal 
which  dares  every  thing  is  the  only  power  to  op 
pose  to  long  rooted  abuses.  But  it  is  not  true 
that  God  has  committed  the  great  work  of  reform 
ing  the  world  to  passion.  Love  is  a  minister  of 
good  only  when  it  gives  energy  to  the  intellect, 
and  allies  itself  with  wisdom.  The  abolitionists 
often  speak  of  Luther's  vehemence  as  a  model  to 
future  reformers.  But  who,  that  has  read  history, 
does  not  know  that  Luther's  reformation  was  ac 
companied  by  tremendous  miseries  and  crimes, 
and  that  its  progress  was  soon  arrested  ?  and  is  there 
not  reason  to  fear,  that  the  fierce,  bitter,  persecut 
ing  spirit,  which  he  breathed  into  the  work,  not  only 
tarnished  its  glory,  but  limited  its  power?  One 
great  principle,  which  we  should  lay  down  as  im 
movably  true,  is,  that  if  a  good  work  cannot  be 
carried  on  by  the  calm,  self-controlled,  benevolent 
spirit  of  Christianity,  then  the  time  for  doing  it  has 


139 

not  come.  God  asks  not  the  aid  of  our  vices.  He 
can  overrule  them  for  good,  but  they  are  not  the 
chosen  instruments  of  human  happiness. 

We,  indeed,  need  zeal,  fervent  zeal,  such  as  will 
fear  no  man's  power,  and  shrink  before  no  man's 
frown,  such  as  will  sacrifice  life  to  truth  and  free 
dom.  But  this  energy  of  will  ought  to  be  joined 
with  deliberate  wisdom  and  universal  charity.  It 
ought  to  regard  the  whole,  in  its  strenuous  efforts 
for  a  part.  Above  all,  it  ought  to  ask  first,  not 
what  means  are  most  effectual,  but  what  means  are 
sanctioned  by  the  Moral  Law  and  by  Christian 
Love.  We  ought  to  think  much  more  of  walking 
in  the  right  path  than  of  reaching  our  end.  We 
should  desire  virtue  more  than  success.  If  by  one 
wrong  deed  we  could  accomplish  the  liberation  of 
millions,  and  in  no  other  way,  we  ought  to  feel 
that  this  good,  for  which,  perhaps,  we  had  prayed 
with  an  agony  of  desire,  was  denied  us  by  God, 
was  reserved  for  other  times  and  other  hands. 
The  first  object  of  a  true  zeal  is,  not  that  we  may 
prosper,  but  that  we  may  do  right,  fhat  we  may 
keep  ourselves  unspotted  from  every  evil  thought, 
word,  and  deed.  Under  the  inspiration  of  such  a 
zeal,  we  shall  not  find  in  the  greatness  of  an  enter 
prise  an  apology  for  intrigue  or  for  violence.  We 
shall  not  need  immediate  success  to  spur  us  to 
exertion.  We  shall  not  distrust  God,  because  he 
does  not  yield  to  the  cry  of  human  impatience  * 


140 

We  shall  not  forsake  a  good  work,  because  it  does 
not  advance  with  a  rapid  step.  Faith  in  truth, 
virtue,  and  Almighty  Goodness,  will  save  us  alike 
from  rashness  and  despair. 

In  lamenting  the  adoption  by  the  abolitionists  of 
the  system  of  agitation  or  extensive  excitement,  I 
do  not  mean  to  condemn  this  mode  of  action  as 
only  evil.  There  are  cases  to  which  it  is  adapted  ; 
and,  in  general,  the  impulse  which  it  gives  is  better 
than  the  selfish,  sluggish  indifference  to  good  ob 
jects,  into  which  the  multitude  so  generally  fall. 
But  it  must  not  supersede  or  be  compared  with 
Individual  action.  The  enthusiasm  of  the  Indi 
vidual  in  a  good  cause  is  a  mighty  power.  The 
forced,  artificially  excited  enthusiasm  of  a  multi 
tude,  kept  together  by  an  organization  which  makes 
them  the  instruments  of  a  few  leading  minds, 
works  superficially,  and  often  injuriously.  I  fear 
that  the  native,  noble-minded  enthusiast  often 
loses  that  single-heartedness  which  is  his  greatest 
power,  when  once  he  strives  to  avail  himself  of  the 
machinery  of  associations.  The  true  power  of  a 
Reformer  lies  in  speaking  truth  purely  from  his  own 
soul,  without  changing  one  tone  for  the  purpose  of 
managing  or  enlarging  a  party.  Truth,  to  be  pow 
erful,  must  speak  in  her  own  words,  and  in  no 
other's,  must  come  forth  with  the  authority  and 
spontaneous  energy  of  inspiration  from  the  depths 
of  the  soul.  It  is  the  voice  of  the  Individual  giv- 


141 


ing  utterance  to  the  irrepressible  conviction  of  his 
own  thoroughly  moved  spirit,  and  not  the  shout  of 
a  crowd,  which  carries  truth  far  into  other  souls, 
and  insures  it  a  stable  empire  on  earth.  For  want 
of  this,  most  which  is  now  done  is  done  superfi 
cially.  The  progress  of  society  depends  chiefly 
on  the  honest  inquiry  of  the  Individual  into  the 
particular  work  ordained  him  by  God,  and  on  his 
simplicity  in  following  out  his  convictions.  This 
moral  independence  is  mightier,  as  well  as  holier, 
than  the  practice  of  getting  warm  in  crowds,  and 
of  waiting  for  an  impulse  from  multitudes.  The 
momenta  man  parts  with  moral  independence;  the 
moment  he  judges  of  duty,  not  from  the  inward 
voice,  but  from  the  interests  and  will  of  a  party  ; 
the  moment  he  commits  himself  to  a  leader  or  a 
body,  and  winks  at  evil,  because  division  would 
hurt  the  cause ;  the  moment  he  shakes  off  his  par 
ticular  responsibility,  because  he  is  but  one  of  a 
thousand  or  million  by  whom  the  evil  is  done ;  that 
moment  he  parts  with  his  moral  power.  He  is 
shorn  of  the  energy  of  singlehearted  faith  in  the 
Right  and  the  True.  He  hopes  from  man's  policy 
what  nothing  but  loyalty  to  God  can  accomplish. 
He  substitutes  coarse  weapons  forged  by  man's 
wisdom  for  celestial  power. 

The  adoption  of  the  common  system  of  agitation 
by  the  abolitionists  has  proved  signally  unsuccessful. 
From  the  beginning  it  created  alarm  in  the  con- 


142 

siderate,  and  strengthened  the  sympathies  of  the  free 
States  with  tlae  slaveholder.  It  made  converts  of  a 
few  individuals,  but  alienated  multitudes.  Its  in 
fluence  at  the  South  has  been  evil  without  mix 
ture.  It  has  stirred  up  bitter  passions  and  a  fierce 
fanaticism,  which  have  shut  every  ear  and  every 
heart  against  its  arguments  and  persuasions.  These 
effects  are  the  more  to  be  deplored,  because  the 
hope  of  freedom  to  the  slave  lies  chiefly  in  the  dis 
positions  of  his  master.  The  abolitionist  proposed, 
indeed,  to  convert  the  slaveholders ;  and  for  this 
end  he  approached  them  with  vituperation,  and 
exhausted  on  them  the  vocabulary  of  abuse  !  And 
he  has  reaped  as  he  sowed.  His  vehement  plead 
ings  for  the  slaves  have  been  answered  by  wilder 
ones  from  the  slaveholder ;  and,  what  is  worse, 
deliberate  defences  of  slavery  have  been  sent  forth, 
in  the  spirit  of  the  dark  ages,  arid  in  defiance  of 
the  moral  convictions  and  feelings  of  the  Christian 
and  civilized  world.  Thus,  with  good  purposes, 
nothing  seems  to  have  been  gained.  Perhaps 
(though  I  am  anxious  to  repel  the  thought)  some 
thing  has  been  lost  to  the  cause  of  freedom  and 
humanity. 

I  earnestly  desire  that  abolitionism  may  lay  aisde 
the  form  of  public  agitation,  and  seek  its  end  by 
wiser  and  milder  means.  I  desire  as  earnestly, 
and  more  earnestly,  that  it  may  not  be  put  down 
by  lawless  force.  There  is  a  worse  evil  than  abo- 


143 

litionism,  and  that  is  the  suppression  of  it  by  law 
less  force.    No  evil  greater  than  this  can  exist  in  the 
State,  and  this  is  never  needed.     Be  it  granted, 
that  it  is  the  design,  or  direct,  palpable,  tendency 
of  abolitionism,  to  stir  up  insurrection  at  the  South, 
and  that  no  existing  laws  can  meet  the  exigency. 
It  is  the  solemn  duty  of  the  Chief  Magistrate  of 
the  State   to  assemble  immediately  the  legislative 
bodies,   and  their  duty  immediately  to  apply  the 
remedy  of  Law.     Let  every  friend  of  freedom,  let 
every  good  man  lift  up  his  voice   against  mobs. 
Through   these  lies  our  road    to  tyranny.     It  is 
these  which  have  spread  the  opinion,   so  common 
at  the  South,  that  the  free   States  cannot  long  sus 
tain  republican  institutions.     No  man  seems  awake 
to  their   inconsistency  with    liberty.     Our  whole 
phraseology   is   in    fault.     Mobs  call  themselves, 
and  are  called,  the  People,  when  in  truth  they 
assail  immediately  the  sovereignty  of  the  People, 
involve  the  guilt  of  usurpation  and  rebellion  against 
the  People.    It  is  the  fundamental  principle  of  our 
institutions,  that  the  People  is  Sovereign.    But  by 
the  People  we  mean  not  an  individual  here  and  there, 
not  a  knot  of  twenty  or  a  hundred  or  a  thousand 
individuals  in  this  or  that  spot,  but  the  Community 
formed  into  a  body  politic,  and  expressing  and  ex 
ecuting  its  will  through  regularly  appointed  organs. 
There  is  but  one  expression  of  the  will  or  Sovereignty 
of  the  People,  and  this  is  Law.     Law  is  the  voice, 


144 

the  living  act  of  the  People.  It  has  no  other. 
When  an  individual  suspends  the  operation  of  Law, 
resists  its  established  ministers,  and  forcibly  substi 
tutes  for  it  his  own  will,  he  is  a  usurper  and  rebel. 
The  same  guilt  attaches  to  a  combination  of  indi 
viduals.  These,  whether  many  or  few,  in  forcibly 
superseding  public  law  and  establishing  their  own, 
rise  up  against  the  People,  as  truly  as  a  single 
usurper.  The  People  should  assert  its  insulted 
majesty,  its  menaced  sovereignty,  in  one  case  as 
decidedly  as  in  the  other.  The  difference  between 
the  mob  and  the  individual  is,  that  the  usurpation 
of  the  latter  has  a  permanence  not  easily  given  to 
the  tumultuary  movements  of  the  former.  The 
distinction  is  a  weighty  one.  Little  importance  is 
due  to  sudden  bursts  of  the  populace,  because  they 
so  soon  pass  away.  But  when  mobs  are  organized, 
as  in  the  French  Revolution,  or  when  they  are 
deliberately  resolved  on  and  systematically  resort 
ed  to,  as  the  means  ^of  putting  down  an  odious 
party,  they  lose  this  apology.  A  conspiracy  exists 
against  the  Sovereignty  of  the  People,  and  ought 
to  be  suppressed,  as  among  the  chief  evils  of  the 
state. 

In  this  part  of  the  country  our  abhorrence  of 
mobs  is  lessened  by  the  fact,  that  they  were  thought 
to  do  good  service  in  the  beginning  of  the  Revo 
lution.  They  probably  were  useful  then  ;  and 
why  ?  The  work  of  that  day  was  Revolution. 


145 

To  subvert  a  government  was  the  fearful  task  to 
which  our  fathers  thought  themselves  summoned. 
Their  duty  they  believed  was  Insurrection.  In 
such  a  work  mobs  had  their  place.  The  govern 
ment  of  the  State  was  in  the  hands  of  its  foes. 
The  People  could  not  use  the  regular  organs  of 
administration,  for  these  were  held  and  employed  by 
the  power  which  they  wished  to  crush.  Violent, 
irregular  efforts  belonged  to  that  day  of  convulsion. 
To  resist  and  subvert  institutions  is  the  very  work 
of  mobs  ;  and  when  these  institutions  are  popular, 
when  their  sole  end  is  to  express  and  execute  the 
will  of  the  People,  then  mobs  are  rebellion  against 
the  People,  and  as  such  should  be  understood  and 
suppressed.  A  people  is  never  more  insulted 
than  when  a  mob  takes  its  name.  Abolition  must 
not  be  put  down  by  lawless  force.  The  attempt 
so  to  destroy  it  ought  to  fail.  Such  attempts 
place  abolitionism  on  a  new  ground.  They  make  it, 
not  the  cause  of  a  few  enthusiasts,  but  the  cause  of 
freedom.  They  identify  it  with  all  our  rights  and 
popular  institutions.  If  the  Constitution  and  the 
laws  cannot  put  it  down,  it  must  stand  ;  and  he 
who  attempts  its  overthrow  by  lawless  force  is  a 
rebel  and  usurper.  The  Supremacy  of  Law  and 
the  Sovereignty  of  the  People  are  one  and 
indivisible.  To  touch  the  one  is  to  violate  the 
other.  This  should  be  laid  down  as  a  first  princi 
ple,  an  axiom,  a  fundamental  article  of  faith  which 
10 


146 


it  must  be  heresy  to  question.  A  newspaper, 
which  openly  or  by  inuendoes  excites  a  mob, 
should  be  regarded  as  sounding  the  tocsin  of  insur 
rection.  On  this  subject  the  public  mind  slum 
bers,  and  needs  to  be  awakened,  lest  it  sleep  the 
sleep  of  death. 

How  obvious  is  it,  that  pretexts  for  mobs  will 
never  be  wanting,  if  this  disorganizing  mode  of 
redressing  evils  be  in  any  case  allowed  !  We  all 
recollect,  that  when  a  recent  attempt  was  made 
on  the  life  of  the  President  of  the  United  States, 
the  cry  broke  forth  from  his  friends,  "  that  the  as 
sassin  was  instigated  by  the  continual  abuse  poured 
forth  on  this  distinguished  man,  and  especially  by 
the  violent  speeches  uttered  daily  in  the  Senate  of 
the  United  States."  Suppose,  now,  that  his  adhe 
rents,  to  save  the  Chief  Magistrate  from  murder, 
and  to  guard  his  constitutional  advisers,  had  formed 
themselves  into  mobs,  to  scatter  the  meetings  of  his 
opponents.  And  suppose  that  they  had  resolved 
to  put  to  silence  the  legislators,  who,  it  was  said, 
had  abused  their  freedom  of  speech  to  blacken 
the  character  and  put  in  peril  the  life  of  the  Chief 
Magistrate.  Would  they  not  have  had  a  better 
pretext  than  mobs  against  abolition  ?  Was  not 
assassination  attempted  ?  Had  not  the  President 
received  letters  threatening  his  life  unless  he  would 
change  his  measures  ?  Can  a  year  or  a  month 

O  » 

pass,  which  will  not  afford  equally  grave  reasons  for 


147 


insurrections  of  the  populace  ?  A  system  of  mobs 
and  a  free  government  cannot  stand  together. 
The  men  who  incite  the  former,  and  especially 
those  who  organize  them,  are  among  the  worst 
enemies  of  the  state.  Of  their  motives  I  do  not 
speak.  They  may  think  themselves  doing  service 
to  their  country,  for  there  is  no  limit  to  the  delu 
sions  of  the  times.  I  speak  only  of  the  nature 
and  tendency  of  their  actions.  They  should  be 
suppressed  at  once  by  law,  and  by  the  moral  sen 
timent  of  an  insulted  people. 

In  addition  to  all  other  reasons,  the  honor  of 
our  nation,  and  the  cause  of  free  institutions 
should  plead  with  us  to  defend  the  laws  from 
insult,  and  social  order  from  subversion.  The 
moral  influence  and  reputation  of  our  country  are 
fast  declining  abroad.  A  letter,  recently  received 
from  one  of  the  most  distinguished  men  of  the 
continent  of  Europe,  expresses  the  universal  feel 
ing  on  the  other  side  of  the  ocean.  After  speak 
ing  of  the  late  encroachments  on  liberty  in  France, 
he  says,  "  On  your  side  of  the  Atlantic,  you  con 
tribute,  also,  to  put  in  peril  the  cause  of  liberty. 
We  did  take  pleasure  in  thinking  that  there  was 
at  least  in  the  New  World  a  country,  where  liberty 
was  well  understood,  where  all  rights  were  guar 
antied,  where  the  people  was  proving  itself  wise 
and  virtuous.  For  some  time  past,  the  news 
we  receive  from  America  is  discourajnnor  In  all 


148 

your  large  cities  we  see  mobs  after  mobs,  and  all 
directed  to  an  odious  purpose.  When  we  speak 
of  liberty,  its  enemies  reply  to  us  by  pointing  to 
America."  The  persecuted  abolitionists  have 
the  sympathies  of  the  civilized  world.  The 
country  which  persecutes  them  is  covering  itself 
with  disgrace,  and  filling  the  hearts  of  the  friends 
of  freedom  with  fear  and  gloom.  Already  des 
potism  is  beginning  to  rejoice  in  the  fulfilment  of 
its  prophecies,  in  our  prostrated  laws  and  dying 
liberties.  Liberty  is,  indeed,  threatened  with 
death  in  a  country,  where  any  class  of  men  are 
stripped  with  impunity  of  their  constitutional 
rights.  All  rights  feel  the  blow.  A  community, 
giving  up  any  of  its  citizens  to  oppression  and 
violence,  invites  the  chains  which  it  suffers  others 
to  wear. 


CHAPTER    VIII. 


DUTIES. 

A  FEW  words  remain  to  be  spoken  in  relation 
to  the  duties  of  the  Free  States.  These  need  to 
feel  the  responsibilities  and  dangers  of  their 
present  position.  The  country  is  approaching  a 
crisis  on  the  greatest  question  which  can  be  pro 
posed  to  it,  a  question  not  of  profit  or  loss,  of  tariffs 
or  banks,  or  any  temporary  interests,  but  a  question 
involving  the  First  Principles  of  freedom,  morals, 
and  religion.  Yet  who  seems  to  be  awake  to  the 
solemnity  of  the  present  moment  ?  Who  seems  to 
be  settling  for  himself  the  great  fundamental 
truths,  by  which  private  efforts  and  public  meas 
ures  are  to  be  determined  ? 

The  North  has  duties  to  perform  towards  the 
South  and  towards  itself.  Let  it  resolve  to 
perform  them  faithfully,  impartially  ;  asking  first 
for  the  Right,  and  putting  entire  confidence  in 
Well-doing.  The  North  is  bound  to  suppress  all 
attempts  of  its  citizens,  should  such  be  threatened, 
to  excite  insurrection  at  the  South,  all  attempts  to 


150 


tamper  with  and  to  dispose  to  violence  the  minds 
of  the  slaves.  The  severest  laws  which  consist  with 
civilization  may  justly  be  resorted  to  for  this  end, 
and  they  should  be  strictly  enforced.  I  believe, 
indeed,  that  there  is  no  special  need  for  new  legisla 
tion  on  the  subject.  I  believe  that  there  was  never 
a  moment,  when  the  slaveholding  States  had  so  little 
to  apprehend  from  the  free,  when  the  moral 
feeling  of  the  community  in  regard  to  the  crime  of 
instigating  revolt  was  so  universal,  thorough,  and 
inflexible,  as  at  the  present  moment.  Still,  if  the 
South  needs  other  demonstrations  than  it  now  has 
of  the  moral  and  friendly  spirit  which  in  this  re 
spect  pervades  the  North,  let  them  be  given. 
Still  more,  it  is  the  duty  of  the  free  States  to  act 
by  opinion,  where  they  cannot  act  by  law,  to  dis 
countenance  a  system  of  agitation,  on  the  subject 
of  slavery,  to  frown  on  passionate 'appeals  to  the 
ignorant,  and  on  indiscriminate  and  inflammatory 
vituperation  of  the  slaveholder.  This  obligation, 
also,  has  been  and  will  be  fulfilled.  There  was 
never  a  stronger  feeling  of  responsibility  in  this 
particular  than  at  the  present  moment. 

There  are,  however,  other  duties  of  the  free 
States,  to  which  they  may  prove  false,  and  which 
they  are  too  willing  to  forget.  They  are  bound,  not 
in  their  public,  but  individual  capacities,  to  use 
every  virtuous  influence  for  the  abolition  of  sla 
very.  They  are  bound  to  encourage  that  manly, 


151 


moral,  religious  discussion  of  it,  through  which 
strength  will  be  given  to  the  continually  increasing 
opinion  of  the  civilized  and  Christian  world  in 
favor  of  personal  freedom.  They  are  bound  to 
seek  and  hold  the  truth  in  regard  to  human  rights, 
to  be  faithful  to  their  principles  in  conversation 
and  conduct,  never,  never  to  surrender  them  to 
private  interest,  convenience,  flattery,  or  fear. 

The  duty  of  being  true  to  our  principles  is  not 
easily  to  be  performed.  At  this  moment  an  im 
mense  pressure  is  driving  the  North  from  its  true 
ground.  God  save  it  from  imbecility,  from 
treachery  to  freedom  and  virtue  !  I  have  certainly 
no  feelings  but  those  of  good-will  towards  the 
South  ;  but  I  speak  the  universal  sentiment  of  this 
part  of  the  country,  when  I  say,  that  the  tone 
which  the  South  has  often  assumed  towards  the 
North  has  been  that  of  a  superior,  atone  unconscious 
ly  borrowed  from  the  habit  of  command,  to  which  it 
is  unhappily  accustomed  by  the  form  of  its  society. 
I  must  add,  that  this  high  bearing  of  the  South  has 
not  always  been  met  by  a  just  consciousness  of 
equality,  a  just  self-respect  at  the  North,  The 
causes  I  will  not  try  to  explain.  The  effect  I 
fear  is  not  to  be  denied.  It  is  said,  that  those,  who 
have  represented  the  North  in  Congress,  have  not 
always  represented  its  dignity,  its  honor;  that 
they  have  not  always  stood  erect  before  the  lofty 
bearing  of  the  South.  Here  lies  our  danger, 


152 


The  North  will  undoubtedly  be  just  to  the  South. 
It  must  also  be  just  to  itself.  This  is  not  the 
time  for  sycophancy,  for  servility,  for  compromise 
of  principle,  for  forgetfulness  of  our  rights.  It  is  the 
time  to  manifest  the  spirit  of  Men,  a  spirit  which 
prizes,  more  than  life,  the  principles  of  liberty,  of 
justice,  of  humanity,  of  pure  morals,  of  pure 
religion. 

Let  it  not  be  thought  that  I  would  recommend 
to  the  North,  what  in  some  parts  of  our  country 
is  called  "  Chivalry,"  a  spirit  of  which  the  duel 
ling  pistol  is  the  best  emblem,  and  which  settles 
controversies  with  blood.  A  Christian  and  civi 
lized  man  cannot  but  be  struck  with  the  approach 
to  barbarism,  with  the  insensibility  to  true  great 
ness,  with  the  incapacity  of  comprehending  the 
divine  virtues  of  Jesus  Christ,  which  mark  what 
is  called  "  chivalry."  I  ask  not  the  man  of  the 
North  to  borrow  it  from  any  part  of  the  country. 
But  I  do  ask  him  to  stand  in  the  presence  of  this 
"  chivalry"  with  the  dignity  of  moral  courage  and 
moral  independence.  Let  him,  at  the  same  mo 
ment,  remember  the  courtesy  and  deference  due 
to  the  differing  opinions  of  others,  and  the  sincer 
ity  and  firmness  due  to  his  own.  Let  him  understand 
the  lofty  position  which  he  holds  on  the  subject 
of  slavery,  and  never  descend  from  it  for  the 
purpose  of  soothing  prejudice  or  disarming  passion. 
Let  him  respect  the  safety  of  the  South,  and  still  man- 


153 

ifest  his  inflexible  adherence  to  the  cause  of  human 
rights  and  personal  freedom. 

On  this  point  I  must  insist,  because  I  see  the 
North  giving  way  to  the  vehemence  of  the  South. 
In  some,  perhaps  many,  of  our  recent  "  Resolu 
tions,"  a  spirit  has  been  manifested,  at  which,  if 
not  we,  our  children  will  blush.  Not  long  ago 
there  were  rumors,  that  some  of  our  citizens 
wished  to  suppress  by  law  all  discussion,  all  ex 
pression  of  opinion  on  slavery,  and  to  send  to  the 
South  such  members  of  our  community  as  might 
be  claimed  as  instigators  of  insurrection.  Such 
encroachments  on  rights  could  not,  of  course,  be 
endured.  We  are  not  yet  so  fallen.  Some 
echoes  of  the  old  eloquence  of  liberty  still  come 
down  to  us  from  our  fathers.  Some  inspirations 
of  heroism  and  freedom  still  issue  from  the  conse 
crated  walls  of  Faneuil  Hall.  Were  we  to  yield 
to  such  encroachments,  would  not  the  soil  of  New 
England,  so  long  trodden  by  freemen,  heave  and 
quake  under  the  steps  of  her  degenerate  sons  ? 
We  are  not  prepared  for  these.  But  a  weak, 
yielding  tone,  for  which  we  seem  to  be  prepared, 
may  be  the  beginning  of  concessions  which  we 
shall  one  day  bitterly  rue. 

The  means  used  at  the  South  to  bring  the 
North  to  compliance  seem  to  demand  particular 
attention.  I  will  not  record  the  contemptuous 
language  which  has  been  thrown  on  the  frugal 


154 


and  money-getting  habits  of  New  England,  or 
the  menaces  which  have  been  addressed  to  our 
cupidity,  for  the  purpose  of  putting  us  to  silence 
on  the  subject  of  slavery.  Such  language  does  in 
no  degree  move  me.  I  only  ask  that  we  may 
give  no  ground  for  its  application.  We  can  easily 
bear  it,  if  we  do  not  deserve  it.  Our  mother- 
country  has  been  called  a  nation  of  shopkeepers, 
and  New  England  ought  not  to  be  provoked  by 
the  name.  Only  let  us  give  no  sanction  to  the 
opinion  that  our  spirit  is  narrowed  to  our  shops ; 
that  we  place  the  art  of  bargaining  above  all  arts, 
all  sciences,  accomplishments,  and  virtues ;  that 
rather  than  lose  the  fruits  of  the  slave's  labor 
we  would  rivet  his  chains ;  that  sooner  than  lose  a 
market  we  would  make  shipwreck  of  honor  ;  that 
sooner  than  sacrifice  present  gain  we  would  break 
our  faith  to  our  fathers  and  our  children,  to  our 
principles  and  our  God.  To  resent  or  retaliate 
reproaches  would  be  unwise  and  unchristian, 
The  only  revenge  worthy  of  a  good  man  is,  to 
turn  reproaches  into  admonitions  against  baseness, 
into  incitements  to  a  more  generous  virtue.  New 
England  has  long  suffered  the  imputation  of  a 
sordid,  calculating  spirit,  of  supreme  devotion  to 
gain.  Let  us  show  that  we  have  principles,  com 
pared  with  which  the  wealth  of  the  world  is  light 
as  air.  It  is  a  common  remark  here,  that  there 
i?  not  a  community  under  heaven,  through  which 


155 

there  is  so  general  a  diffusion  of  intelligence  and 
healthful  moral  sentiment  as  in  New  England. 
Let  not  the  just  influence  of  such  a  society  be 
impaired  by  any  act  which  would  give  to  prejudice 
the  aspect  of  truth. 

The  free  States,  it  is  to  be  feared,  must  pass 
through  a  struggle.  May  they  sustain  it  as 
becomes  their  freedom  !  The  present  excitement 
at  the  South  can  hardly  be  expected  to  pass  away, 
without  attempts  to  wrest  from  them  unworthy 
concessions.  The  tone  in  regard  to  slavery  in 
that  part  of  our  country  is  changed.  It  is  not 
only  more  vehement,  but  more  false  than  formerly. 
Once  slavery  was  acknowledged  as  an  evil.  Now 
it  is  proclaimed  to  be  a  good.  We  have  even  been 
told,  not  by  a  handful  of  enthusiasts  in  private  life, 
but  by  men  in  the  highest  station  and  of  widest  influ 
ence  at  the  South,  that  slavery  is  the  soil  into  which 
political  freedom  strikes  its  deepest  roots,  and 
that  republican  institutions  are  never  so  secure  as 
when  the  laboring  class  is  reduced  to  servitude. 
Certainly,  no  assertion  of  the  wildest  abolitionist 
could  give  such  a  shock  to  the  slaveholder,  as  this 
new  doctrine  is  fitted  to  give  to  the  people  of  the, 
North.  Liberty,  with  a  slave  for  her  pedestal, 
and  with  a  chain  in  her  hand,  differs  so  entirely 
from  that  lovely  vision,  that  benignant  Divinity, 
to  which  we,  like  our  fathers,  have  paid  homage, 
that  we  cannot  endure  that  both  should  be  callecj 


156 

by  the  same  name.  A  doctrine,  more  wounding  or 
insulting  to  the  mechanics,  farmers,  laborers  of  the 
North  than  this  strange  heresy,  cannot  well  be  con 
ceived.  A  doctrine  more  irreverent,  more  fatal  to 
republican  institutions,  was  never  fabricated  in  the 
councils  of  despotism.  It  does  not,  however,  pro 
voke  us.  I  recall  it  only  to  show  the  spirit  in 
which  slavery  is  upheld,  and  to  remind  the  free 
States  of  the  calm  energy  which  they  will  need, 
to  keep  themselves  true  to  their  own  principles  of 
liberty. 

There  is  a  great  dread  in  this  part  of  the  country, 
that  the  union  of  the  States  may  be  dissolved^by 
the  conflict  about  slavery.  To  avert  this  evil, 
every  sacrifice  should  be  made  but  that  of  honor, 
freedom,  and  principle.  No  one  prizes  the  Union 
more  than  myself.  Perhaps  I  may  be  allowed 
to  say,  that  I  am  attached  to  it  by  no  common 
love.  Most  men  value  the  Union  as  a  Means  ;  to 
me  it  is  an  End.  Most  would  preserve  it  for  the 
prosperity  of  which  it  is  the  instrument ;  I  love 
and  would  preserve  it  for  its  own  sake.  Some 
value  it  as  favoring  public  improvements,  facilities 
of  commercial  exchange,  &c, ;  I  value  these  im 
provements  and  exchanges  chiefly  as  favoring 
union.  I  ask  of  the  General  Government  to 
unite  us,  to  hold  us  together  as  brethren  in  peace ; 
and  I  care  little  whether  it  does  any  thing  else. 
So  dear  to  me  is  union.  It  is  our  highest  national 
interest.  All  the  pecuniary  sacrifices  which  it  can 


157 

possibly  demand  should  be  made  for  it.  The 
politicians  in  some  parts  of  our  country,  who  are 
calculating  its  value,  and  are  willing  to  surrender 
it,  because  they  may  grow  richer  by  separation, 
seem  to  me  bereft  of  reason.  Still,  if  the  Union 
can  be  preserved  only  by  the  imposition  of  chains 
on  speech  and  the  press,  by  prohibition  of  discus 
sion  on  a  subject  involving  the  most  sacred  rights 
and  dearest  interests  of  humanity,  then  union 
would  be  bought  at  too  dear  a  rate  ;  ihen  it  would 
be  changed  from  a  virtuous  bond  into  a  league 
of  crime  and  shame.  Language  cannot  easily 
do  justice  to  our  attachment  to  the  Union.  We 
will  yield  every  thing  to  it  but  Truth,  Honor,  and 
Liberty.  These  we  can  never  yield. 

Let  the  free  States  be  firm,  but  also  patient, 
forbearing,  and  calm.  From  the  slaveholder  they 
cannot  look  for  perfect  self-control.  From  his 
position  he  would  be  more  than  man,  were  he  to 
observe  the  bounds  of  moderation.  The  con 
sciousness  which  tranquillizes  the  mind  can  hardly 
be  his.  On  this  subject  he  has  always  been  sensi 
tive  to  excess.  Much  exasperation  is  to  be  ex 
pected.  Much  should  be  borne.  Every  thing 
may  be  surrendered  but  our  principles  and  our 
rights. 

My  work  is  done.  I  ask  and  hope  for  it  the 
Divine  blessing,  as  far  as  it  expresses  Truth,  and 


158 


breathes  the  spirit  of  Justice  and  Humanity.  If 
I  have  written  any  thing  under  the  influence  of 
prejudice,  passion,  or  unkindness  to  any  human 
being,  I  ask  forgiveness  of  God  and  man.  I 
have  spoken  strongly,  not  to  offend  or  give  pain, 
but  to  produce  in  others  deep  convictions  corres 
ponding  to  my  own.  Nothing  but  a  feeling, 
which  I  could  not  escape,  of  the  need  of  such  a 
work  at  this  very  moment,  has  induced  me  to  fix 
my  thoughts  on  so  painful  a  subject.  The  few 
last  months  have  increased  my  solicitude  for  the 
country.  Public  sentiment  has  seemed  to  me  to 
be  losing  its  healthfulness  and  vigor.  I  have  seen 
symptoms  of  the  decline  of  the  old  spirit  of  liber 
ty.  Servile  opinions  have  seemed  to  gain  ground 
among  us.  The  faith  of  our  fathers  in  free  in 
stitutions  has  waxed  faint,  and  is  giving  place  to 
despair  of  human  improvements.  I  have  per 
ceived  a  disposition  to  deride  abstract  rights,  to 
speak  of  freedom  as  a  dream,  and  of  republican 
governments  as  built  on  sand*  I  have  perceived 
a  faint-heartedness  in  the  cause  of  human  rights. 
The  condemnation,  which  has  been  passed  on 
abolitionists,  has  seemed  to  be  settling  into  acqui 
escence  in  slavery.  The  sympathies  of  the  com 
munity  have  been  turned  from  the  slave  to  the 
master.  The  impious  doctrine,  that  human  laws 
can  repeal  the  Divine,  can  convert  unjust  and 
oppressive  power  into  a  moral  right,  has  more  and 


159 

more  tinctured  the  style  of  conversation  and  the 
press.  With  these  sad  and  solemn  views  of  so 
ciety,  I  could  not  be  silent ;  and  I  thank  God, 
amidst  the  consciousness  of  great  weakness  and 
imperfection,  that  I  have  been  able  to  offer  this 
humble  tribute,  this  sincere,  though  feeble,  tes 
timony,  this  expression  of  heartfelt  allegiance,  to 
the  cause  of  Freedom,  Justice,  and  Humanity. 

Having  stated  the  circumstances  which  have 
moved  me  to  write,  I  ought  to  say,  that  they  do 
not  discourage  me.  Were  darker  omens  to  gather 
round  us,  I  should  not  despair.  With  a  faith  like 
his,  who  came  to  prepare  the  way  for  the  Great 
Deliverer,  I  feel  and  can  say,  "  The  Kingdom  of 
Heaven,"  the  Reign  of  Justice  and  Disinterested 
Love,  "  is  at  hand,  and  All  Flesh  shall  see  the 
Salvation  of  God."  I  know,  and  rejoice  to  know, 
that  a  power,  mightier  than  the  prejudices  and 
oppression  of  ages,  is  working  on  earth  for  the 
world's  redemption,  the  power  of  Christian  Truth 
and  Goodness.  It  descended  from  Heaven  in  the 
person  of  Christ.  It  was  manifest  in  his  life  and 
-death.  From  his  cross  it  went  forth  conquering 
and  to  conquer.  Its  mission  is  "  to  preach  deliv 
erance  to  the  captive,  and  to  set  at  liberty  them 
that  are  bound."  It  has  opened  many  a  prison- 
door.  It  is  ordained  to  break  every  chain.  1 
have  faith  in  its  triumphs.  I  do  not,  cannot 
despair. 


NOTES. 


NOTE    L 

I  WISH  to  add  a  few  statements  to  show  how  little 
reliance  can  be  placed  on  what  seem  to  a  superficial 
observer  mitigations  or  advantages  of  slavery,  and 
how  much  safer  it  is  to  argue  from  the  experience  of 
all  times  and  from  the  principles  of  human  nature, 
than  from  insulated  facts. 

I  once  passed  a  colored  woman  at  work  on  a 
plantation,  who  was  singing  apparently  with  anima 
tion,  and  whose  general  manners  would  have  led  me 
to  set  her  down  as  the  happiest  of  the  gang,  I  said 
to  her,  "  Your  work  seems  pleasant  to  you."  She 
replied,  "  No,  Massa."  Supposing  that  she  referred 
to  something  particularly  disagreeable  in  her  immedi 
ate  occupation,  I  said  to  her,  "  Tell  me,  then,  what 
part  of  your  work  is  most  pleasant."  She  answered, 
with  much  emphasis,  "  No  part  pleasant.  We  forced 
to  do  it."  These  few  words  let  me  into  the  heart  of 
the  slave.  I  saw  under  its  apparent  lightness  a 
human  heart. 

On  this  plantation,  the  most  favored  woman,  whose 
life  was  the  easiest,  earnestly  besought  a  friend  of 
mine  to  buy  her  and  put  her  in  the  way  to  earn  her 
freedom.  A  daughter  of  this  woman,  very  young,  had 

11 


162 


fallen  a  victim  to  the  manager  of  the  estate.  How 
far  this  cause  influenced  the  exasperated  mother, 
I  did  not  learn. 

I  heard  of  an  estate  managed  by  an  individual 
who  was  considered  as  singularly  successful,  and  who 
was  able  to  govern  the  slaves  without  the  use  of  the 
whip.  I  was  anxious  to  see  him,  and  trusted  that 
some  discovery  had  been  made  favorable  to  humanity. 
I  asked  him  how  he  was  able  to  dispense  with  corporal 
punishment.  He  replied  to  me,  with  a  very  deter 
mined  look,  "  The  slaves  know  that  the  work  must 
be  done,  and  that  it  is  better  to  do  it  without  punish 
ment  than  with  it."  In  other  words,  the  certainty 
and  dread  of  chastisement  were  so  impressed  on 
them  that  they  never  incurred  it. 

I  then  found  that  the  slaves  on  this  wTell  managed 
estate  decreased  in  number.  I  asked  the  cause. 
He  replied,  with  perfect  frankness  and  ease,  fc  The 
gang  is  not  large  enough  for  the  estate.'3  In  other 
words,  they  were  hot  equal  to  the  work  of  the  plan 
tation  and  yet  wrere  made  to  do  it,  though  with  the 
certainty  of  abridging  life. 

On  this  plantation  the  huts  were  uncommonly  con 
venient.  There  was  an  unusual  air  of  neatness.  A 
superficial  observer  would  have  called  the  slaves 
happy.  Yet  they  were  living  under  a  severe,  subdu 
ing  discipline,  and  were  overworked  to  a  degree  that 
shortened  life. 

I  cannot  forget  my  feelings  on  visiting  a  hospital 
belonging  to  the  plantation  of  a  gentleman  highly 
esteemed  for  his  virtues,  and  whose  manners  and 
conversation  expressed  much  benevolence  and  con 
scientiousness.  When  I  entered  with  him  the  hos 
pital,  the  first  object  on  which  my  eye  fell  was  a 


163 


young  woman,  very  ill,  probably  approaching  death. 
She  was  stretched  on  the  floor.  Her  head  rested  on 
something  like  a  pillow  ;  but  her  body  and  limbs  were 
extended  on  the  hard  boards.  The  owner,  I  doubt 
not,  had,  at  least,  as  much  kindness  as  myself;  but  he 
was  so  used  to  see  the  slaves  living  without  common 
comforts,  that  the  idea  of  unkindness  in  the  present 
instance  did  not  enter  his  mind. 

The  severest  blow  I  ever  saw  given  to  a  slave  was 
inflicted  by  a  colored  driver  on  a  young  girl,  who,  on 
removing  a  load  of  wood  from  a  horse,  had  let  a  stick 
fall  against  the  animal's  leg.  I  remonstrated  with  the 
man,  as  soon  as  an  opportunity  offered,  against  his 
inhumanity.  He  said,  "  Massa,  I  have  the  care  of 
the  horse,  and  the  manager  lick  me  if  it  get  hurt." 
This  answer  explained  to  me  the  common  remark, 
that  the  black  drivers  are  more  cruel  than  the  whites. 
I  saw  where  the  cruelty  began. 

I  once  heard  some  slaves,  who  had  been  taken  by 
law  from  their  master,  singing  a  song  of  their  own 
composition,  and  at  the  end  of  every  stanza  they 
joined  with  a  complaining  tone  in  a  chorus,  of  which 
the  burden  was,  "We  got  no  Massa."  Here  seemed 
a  striking  proof  of  attachment  to  the  master  ;  but  on 
inquiry  into  the  rest  of  the  song,  I  found  it  was  an 
angry  repetition  of  the  severities  which  they  were 
suffering  from  the  new  superintendent.  They  wanted 
their  master  as  an  escape  from  cruelty. 

Facts  of  this  kind,  which  make  no  noise,  which 
escape  or  mislead  a  casual  observer,  help  to  show  the 
character  of  slavery  more  than  occasional  excesses 
of  cruelty  though  these  must  be  frequent.  They  show 
how  deceptive  are  the  appearances  of  good  connect 
ed  with  it  ;  and  how  much  may  be  suffered  under 


164 


the  manifestation  of  much  kindness.  Itis,  in  fact,  next 
to  impossible  to  estimate  precisely  the  evils  of  slavery. 
The  slave  writes  no  books,  and  the  slaveholder  is  too 
inured  to  the  system,  and  too  much  interested  in  it,  to 
be  able  to  comprehend  it.  Perhaps  the  Laws  of  the 
slave  States  are  the  most  unexceptionable  witnesses 
which  we  can  obtain  from  that  quarter  ;  and  the  bar 
barity  of  these  is  decisive  testimony  against  an  insti 
tution  which  requires  such  means  for  its  support. 


NOTE    II. 

I  THINK  it  right  to  state,  that  my  views  of  abolition 
ism  have  been  founded  in  part,  perhaps  chiefly,  on  the 
testimony  of  others.  I  have  attended  no  abolition- 
meetings,  and  never  heard  an  abolition-address.  But 
the  strong,  and  next  to  universal  impression,  in  regard 
to  the  tendency  of  the  operations  of  this  party  to  inflame 
common  minds,  confirmed,  as  it  is,  by  what  I  have  seen 
of  their  newspapers,  must  be  essentially  true.  The 
orator,  who  was  chiefly  employed  in  addressing  their 
meetings  and  forming  societies,  was  distinguished  by 
his  vehemence  and  passionate  invectives.  On  one 
occasion,  there  is  strong  proof  of  his  having  given  an 
opinion  in  favor  of  cruel  vengeance  on  the  part  of  the 
slaves.  This  seems  to  contradict  what  I  have  said  of 
the  steady  inculcation  of  forbearance  and  non-resist 
ance  by  the  abolitionists.  But  this  case,  if  correctly 
reported,  was  an  exception,  an  ebullition  of  uncon 
trollable  passion  in  an  individual,  for  which  the  rest 
were  not  responsible.  I  have  thought  it  my  duty  to 
state  the  kind  of  evidence  on  which  my  views  of  abo- 


165 

litionism  are  founded,  that  others  may  better  judge 
what  confidence  is  due  to  them.  In  times  of  great 
excitement,  it  is  not  easy  to  arrive  at  the  precise 
truth. 


NOTE  III. 

IT  was  my  purpose  to  address  a  chapter  to  the 
South,  but  the  failure  of  strength  compelled  me  to 
pause  ;  and  when  I  considered,  that  the  circulation  of 
my  book  in  that  part  of  the  country  might  be  a  crime, 
I  had  no  encouragement  to  proceed.  I  beg,  however, 
to  say,  that  nothing  which  I  have  written  can  have 
proceeded  from  unkind  feeling  towards  the  South  ;  for 
in  no  other  part  of  the  country  have  my  writings  found 
a  more  gratifying  reception  ;  from  no  other  part  have  I 
received  stronger  expressions  of  sympathy.  To  these  I 
am  certainly  not  insensible.  My  own  feelings,  had  I 
consulted  them,  would  have  led  me  to  stifle  every  ex 
pression,  which  could  give  pain  to  those  from  whom  I 
have  received  nothing  but  good-will. 

I  wished  to  suggest  to  the  slaveholders,  that  the  ex 
citement  now  prevalent  among  themselves,  was  incom 
parably  more  perilous,  more  fitted  to  stir  up  insurrec 
tion,  than  all  the  efforts  of  abolitionists,  allowing  these 
to  be  ever  so  corrupt.  I  also  wished  to  remind  the 
men  of  principle  and  influence  in  that  part  of  the 
country,  of  the  necessity  of  laying  a  check  on  lawless 
procedures,  in  regard  to  the  citizens  of  the  North. 
We  have  heard  of  large  subscriptions  at  the  South  for 
the  apprehension  of  some  of  the  abolitionists  in  the 
free  States,  and  for  the  transportation  of  them  to  parts 
of  the  country  where  they  would  meet  the  fate,  which, 


166 


it  is  said,  they  deserve.  Undoubtedly  the  respectable 
portion  of  the  slaveholding  communities  are  not  an 
swerable  for  these  measures.  But  does  not  policy,  as 
well  as  principle,  require  such  men  steadily  to  dis 
countenance  them  ?  At  present,  the  free  States  have 
stronger  sympathies  with  the  South  than  ever  before. 
But  can  it  be  supposed  that  they  will  suffer  tho;"  >;ti- 
zens  to  be  stolen,  exposed  to  violence,  and  murdered, 
by  other  States  ?  Would  not  such  an  outrage  rouse 
them  to  feel  and  act  as  one  man  ?  Would  it  not  iden 
tify  the  abolitionists  with  our  most  sacred  rights  ? 
One  kidnapped,  murdered  abolitionist  would  do  more 
for  the  violent  destruction  of  slavery  than  a  thousand 
societies.  His  name  would  be  sainted.  The  day  of 
his  death  would  be  set  apart  for  solemn  heart-stirring 
commemoration.  His  blood  would  cry  through  the 
land  with  a  thrilling  voice,  would  pierce  every  dwell 
ing,  and  find  a  response  in  every  heart.  Do  men, 
under  the  light  of  the  present  day,  need  to  be  told, 
that  enthusiasm  is  not  a  flame  to  be  quenched  with 
blood  ?  On  this  point,  good  and  wise  men,  and  the 
friends  of  the  country  at  the  North  and  South,  can 
hold  but  one  opinion  ;  and  if  the  press,  which,  I  grieve 
to  say,  has  kept  an  ominous  silence  amidst  the  viola 
tions  of  law  and  rights,  would  but  speak  plainly  and 
strongly,  the  danger  would  be  past. 

Since  writing  the  preceding  chapters,  I  have  seen  in 
a  Newspaper  some  notice  of  a  meeting  of  ministers 
in  one  of  the  Southern  States,  in  which  slavery  was 
spoken  of  as  sinful.  If  the  account  was  correct,  the 
liberty  of  speech  is  not  every  where  denied  to  the 
degree  which  I  had  supposed. 

I  have  only  to  add,  that  I  alone  am  responsible  for 
what  I  have  now  written.  I  represent  no  society,  no 


167 

body  of  men,  no  part  of  the  country.  I  have  written 
by  no  one's  instigation,  and  with  no  one's  encourage 
ment,  but  solely  from  my  own  convictions.  It'otlence 
is  given,  I  alone  ought  to  bear  it. 


14  DAY  USE 

RETURN  TO  DESK  FROM  WHICH  BORROWED 

LOAN  DEPT. 

This  book  is  due  on  the  last  date  stamped  below,  or 

on  the  date  to  which  renewed. 
Renewed  books  are  subject  to  immediate  recall. 


APR      4  1962 


REC'D  LD 


F?  >=%...-     '  ,  ,  ' 


JAN  2  8 '66 -12 


QCT  2  5  199! 


9    '6689RCO 


.TION  DEIPT. 


REC'D  LD- 


i.  ,     .  'CO     10  U 

IIUW    1   If.  WW     lit  Iw 


DEC!  1 '64 -5PM 


f  I  6  1986 


iRCULATION  DEPT.1 


AUG  031991 


LD  21  A-50m-8,6rd 
(C179oslO)476B 


H)TOD1SCJUL25'91 


General  Library 

University  of  California 

Berkeley 


GENERAL  LIBRARY  -  U.C.  BERKELEY 


M521317 


